UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
AT  LOS  ANGELES 


GIFT   OF   CAPT.   AND    MRS. 
PAUL   MCBRIDE  PERIGORD 


r(T 


VV\-^^  ^     i^^^ 


UNIVERSITY  of  CALIFORMl^ 

AT 

LOS  ANGELES 

LIBRARY 


A  DEFENCE  OF  PREJUDICE 

AND  OTHER    ESSAYS 


BOOKS  BY  JOHN  GRIER  HIBBEN,  Ph.D. 
PUBLISHED  BY  CHARLES  SCRIBNER'S  SONS 


A  DEFENCE  OF  PREJUDICE  AND  OTHER 

ESSAYS    ....         (.Postage  extra)  net  $1 .00 

THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  THE  ENLIGHTEN- 
MENT (fi/ioc/z.?  0/ P/M'/oMMy)         .        .        net  1.50 

LOGIC,  DEDUCTIVE  AND  INDUCTIVE       nel  1.40 

THE  PROBLEMS  OF  PHILOSOPHY     .       net  1.00 

HEGEL'S  LOGIC nel  1.25 


A 
DEFENCE  OF  PREJUDICE 


AND  OTHER  ESSAYS 


BY 


JOHN  GRIER  HIBBEN,  Ph.D.,  LL.D. 

Stuart  Professor  of  Logic,  Princeton  University 


CHARLES   SCRIBNER'S   SONS 
NEW    YORK     :     :     :     :     :      1911 


.5  b  'i  O  J 


Copyright,  ioii.bv 
CHARLES  SCRIBNER'S  SONS 


Published  April,  igii 


tSTo 
MOSES  TAYLOR  PYNE 

A  FRIEND    FOR    WHOM 
MY  PREJUDICE  NEEDS  NO   DEFENCE 


73 

O 


CONTENTS 

ESSAY  PAGE 

I.  A  Defence  of  Prejudice i 

11.  The  Philosophy  of  Opposition    ...  i8 

III.  The  Paradox  of  Research      ....  36 

IV.  On  Responsibility 52 

V.  The  Whole  and  the  Part 68 

VI.  The  Gospel  of  Might 84 

VII.  The  Dialectic  Imagination    ....  103 

VIII.  The  Art  of  Thinking 119 

IX.  The  Vocation  of  the  Scholar     .     .     .  139 

X.  The  Superfluous  in  Education  .     .    .  154 

XI.  Secondary  Strains 168 


I 

A  DEFENCE  OF  PREJUDICE 

'IIT'HAT  is  prejudice  ?  Is  it  always  some- 
thing unreasonable  ?  Is  it  to  be  re- 
garded necessarily  as  an  intruder  among  the 
more  sober  activities  of  the  mind  ?  Is  it  the 
enemy  of  clear  thinking  ?  Is  it  the  counterfeit 
of  a  true  judgment?  There  are  many  who 
would  give  an  unqualified  assent  to  these  char- 
acterizations of  the  nature  of  prejudice.  I  am 
persuaded,  however,  that  there  is  a  certain 
form  of  prejudice  that  admits  of  a  rational  de- 
fence. In  this  defence,  moreover,  I  am  not 
taking  merely  the  part  of  a  devil's  advocate; 
but,  on  the  contrary,  I  am  profoundly  con- 
vinced that  there  is  a  prejudice  which  has  a 
proper  place  in  the  processes  of  the  mind,  and 
must  be  reckoned  with  as  a  natural  factor  in 
our  thinking,  and  is  not  to  be  regarded  in  any 
sense  as  an  abnormal  and  disturbing  element. 
It  is  very  easy  to  insist  that  reason  should  be 
free  from  all  taint  of  prejudice;    but  no  one 


2  A  DEFENCE  OF  PREJUDICE 

actually  maintains  consistently  and  continu- 
ously so  high  an  ideal  as  this  in  practice.  This 
is  not  merely  a  confession  of  weakness  that 
prejudices  will  steal  into  the  deliberations  of 
reason  despite  our  most  vigilant  guard,  and  in 
the  face  of  protest  and  serious  effort  on  our 
part  to  drive  them  out;  there  is,  on  the  con- 
trary, substantial  ground  for  the  contention  that 
prejudice  has  a  legitimate  function  to  perform 
amidst  the  varied  activities  of  the  mind. 

A  prejudice  is  not  always  an  unreasonable 
judgment;  it  may  be  merely  a  judgment  which 
is  unreasoned.  There  is  a  vast  difference  to 
be  noted  in  this  distinction.  An  unreasonable 
judgment  is,  of  course,  contrary  to  reason  and 
therefore  reason  itself  must  repudiate  it.  But  the 
judgment  which  is  simply  unreasoned  may  prove 
in  the  course  of  events  to  be  eminently  reason- 
able, and  as  such  even  in  its  unreasoned  form 
may  serve  a  most  useful  purpose  in  our  thinking. 

These  unreasoned  judgments  are  absolutely 
indispensable  in  the  economy  of  our  mental 
life.  If  we  exclude  all  judgments  which  are 
not  accompanied  by  a  satisfactory  proof  of 
their  validity,  a  tremendous  waste  of  time  and 


A  DEFENCE  OF  PREJUDICE  3 

energy  would  inevitably  result.  For  it  is  a  fun- 
damental law  of  our  intellectual  activity  that 
the  processes  of  reason  by  which  we  arrive  at 
certain  conclusions  often  drop  out  of  memory: 
but  the  conclusions  themselves  remain  as  a 
permanent  deposit  of  knowledge.  The  proof 
which  v^e  once  knew  and  perfectly  understood 
may  be  forgotten,  but  the  truth  which  it  served 
to  establish  is  lodged  permanently  in  the  mem- 
ory. The  history  of  its  origin  we  can  no  longer 
recall  to  mind.  It  has  no  recognized  ances- 
try; because  much  of  our  knowledge  changes 
form  in  the  processes  of  assimilation.  Its  orig- 
inal setting  is  forgotten.  It  appears,  therefore, 
as  a  detached  judgment.  It  is  a  part  of  the 
stored  energy  of  thought.  The  truth  has  be- 
come ours  in  a  pecuhar  sense  inasmuch  as  it 
has  been  merged  into  the  very  texture  of  our 
thought.  There  may  also  be  associated  with  it 
the  impression,  indefinite  and  vague  though  it 
be,  that  as  a  reasoned  judgment  it  once  passed 
muster  and  received  the  endorsement  of  reason. 
The  proof  is  forgotten,  the  credentials  are  lost, 
but  the  thought  remains.  Although  for  the 
moment  it  cannot  be  justified  by  the  law  of 


4  A  DEFENCE  OF  PREJUDICE 

sufficient  reason,  it  nevertheless  is  allowed  a 
place  in  our  world  of  knowledge.  The  econ- 
omy of  the  thought  processes  not  only  warrants 
such  a  procedure,  but  demands  it  as  a  neces- 
sary method  in  all  of  our  thinking.  Any  im- 
pression which  we  vaguely  recognize  but  cannot 
justify  rationally  must  certainly  be  regarded  as 
a  form  of  prejudice. 

We  have  only  to  examine  our  store  of  knowl- 
edge in  order  to  discover  what  a  vast  amount 
of  it  is  represented  by  these  remote  survivals  of 
past  study  and  travail  of  mind.  The  princi- 
ples of  a  science,  for  instance,  are  remembered 
and  accepted  as  true,  and  it  may  be  at  times 
are  used  by  us  in  some  practical  emergency; 
and  yet  how  mysteriously  vague  and  elusive 
seem  the  proofs  upon  which  they  rest  and 
which  we  long  ago  so  carefully  mastered.  We 
assent  with  complete  confidence  to  the  Newton- 
ian law  of  universal  attraction;  we  beheve  that 
the  earth  moves  around  the  sun;  we  are  in 
complete  accord  with  the  proposition  that  the 
square  on  the  hypothenuse  of  a  right-angled 
triangle  is  equal  to  the  sum  of  the  squares  on 
the  two  sides.     There  is  indeed  an  uncomfort- 


A  DEFENCE  OF  PREJUDICE  5 

able  familiarity  about  these  utterances.  But 
when  we  are  pressed  for  a  justification  of  our 
belief  in  statements  such  as  these,  then  all  that 
we  can  say  perhaps  is  simply  that  in  a  general 
way  there  is  a  true  ring  about  them.  In  other 
words,  they  are  judgments  to  which  we  give 
assent,  but  which  we  cannot  prove, — that  is, 
prejudices.  And  yet  the  fact  that  they  partake 
of  the  hospitality  of  our  minds  is  not  to  be 
regarded  necessarily  as  a  weak  concession  of 
ignorance  on  our  part,  but  rather  the  normal 
manner  in  which  the  laborious  processes  of 
past  thinking  are  definitely  concentrated  and 
recorded. 

I  think  we  will  all  recognize  a  similar  mental 
experience  if  we  stop  to  challenge  our  opinions 
concerning  the  character  of  a  person  or  of  a 
period  in  history.  There  are  a  few  instances, 
perhaps,  concerning  which  we  have  recently  re- 
freshed our  memory  or  which  lie,  it  may  be,  in 
the  immediate  sphere  of  our  especial  study  and 
interest  that  lend  themselves  to  a  satisfactory 
and  adequate  interpretation.  Outside  of  an 
exceedingly  circumscribed  area,  however,  we 
find   ourselves   unable   to   justify   certain   esti- 


6  A  DEFENCE  OF  PREJUDICE 

mates  of  character,  certain  impressions  of  a 
sense  of  value  and  significance,  which  we  never- 
theless firmly  maintain,  and  that  often  with 
feeling  and  fervor.  We  have  opinions,  possi- 
bly very  pronounced,  regarding  the  character 
of  the  Black  Prince,  or  of  Poppaea,  or  of  St. 
Francis;  but  would  it  not  be  difficult,  if  not 
altogether  impossible,  to  justify  each  judgment 
by  an  array  of  indisputable  facts  which  we 
could  summon  upon  call  from  the  remote 
stretches  of  the  memory  ?  If  we  cannot  sup- 
port our  opinions  by  adequate  proof,  is  it  not 
quite  correct  to  regard  them  in  the  light  of 
prejudices  ?  And  if  we  rid  our  stock  of  knowl- 
edge consistently  and  thoroughly  of  all  such 
prejudices,  are  we  not  impoverishing  our  minds 
for  the  sake  of  an  ideal  which  is  quixotic  and 
impossible  ?  The  rigor  of  reason  must  be  tem- 
pered in  this  respect  to  the  natural  limitations 
of  our  mental  powers. 

There  is  still  another  kind  of  prejudice  which 
is  similar  to  that  just  considered,  namely — the 
class  of  judgments  which  are  born  of  other 
minds  and  which  nevertheless  we  come  to 
appropriate  as  our  own.     The  reasons  in  which 


A  DEFENCE  OF  PREJUDICE  7 

such  judgments  are  grounded  we  have  never 
examined  ourselves, — possibly  v^e  could  never 
understand  them  even  if  they  w^ere  presented 
to  us  with  the  most  elaborate  explanations; 
and  yet  these  second-hand  judgments  cannot 
be  eliminated  wholly  from  our  body  of  knowl- 
edge without  an  incalculable  loss.  The  pri- 
mary sources  of  knowledge  are  not  available 
to  all  persons.  There  are  many  truths  which 
are  supported  only  upon  expert  testimony,  and 
which  nevertheless  become  the  common  prop- 
erty of  mankind.  Knowledge  comes  by  reflec- 
tion as  well  as  by  assimilation.  And  the  light 
that  is  reflected  from  another's  mind  we  should 
never  despise;  for  there  is  a  community  in  the 
treasures  of  thought.  We  possess  far  more 
than  we  earn.  There  is  a  universal  liberty  of 
appropriation;  for  the  wealth  of  knowledge  like 
the  bounty  of  nature  is  free  to  all.  If,  therefore, 
we  exclude  these  prejudices  of  reflected  opinion 
from  our  thinking,  no  harvest  of  thought  is 
possible  save  that  of  our  own  sowing  and  till- 
ing. And  this  would  signify  an  appreciable 
shrinking  of  our  world  in  all  of  its  dimensions; 
for  there  is  no  thought,  however  original,  which 


8  A  DEFENCE  OF  PREJUDICE 

does  not  rest  to  some  extent  at  least  upon  a 
credit  basis. 

There  is  another  class  of  judgments  which 
merits  the  name  of  prejudice.  It  comprises 
those  judgments  whose  source  may  be  traced 
to  the  subconscious  states  of  the  mind.  We 
must  acknowledge  that  much  of  our  thinking 
is  singularly  affected  by  the  processes  which 
are  connected  with  the  more  obscure  activi- 
ties of  thought.  There  is  a  secret  collaborator 
within,  whose  contributions  do  not  seem  to  bear 
the  stamp  of  our  own  creation,  but  which  we 
have  no  hesitation  in  claiming  and  using  as 
our  own.  They  are  ours  and  yet  not  ours. 
We  must  not  fall  into  the  error,  however,  of 
characterizing  these  judgments  which  spring 
from  the  subconscious  region  of  the  mind  as 
abnormal.  They,  on  the  contrary,  are  the  nor- 
mal reflex  of  our  conscious  activities.  They 
may  be  trusted  to  the  extent  that  we  trust  the 
judgments  which  we  form  through  the  con- 
scious procedure  of  reason.  The  intuitions  of 
a  fool  are  not  wisdom.  On  the  other  hand 
however,  if  the  exercise  of  our  faculties  at  the 
focal  point  of  consciousness  is  uniformly  true. 


A  DEFENCE  OF  PREJUDICE  9 

then  it  follows  naturally  that  the  activities 
which  find  play  within  the  penumbral  area  of 
our  minds  will  be  determined  by  a  like  habit. 
If  reason  is  the  controlling  factor  in  the  con- 
scious evolution  of  our  opinions  generally,  then 
reason  will  hold  sway  within  the  realm  of  the 
subconscious  operations;  but  if  on  the  con- 
trary we  have  formed  the  habit  of  following 
the  suggestions  of  fugitive  feelings,  of  whim 
and  caprice,  we  may  be  quite  sure  that  we  will 
discover  no  trace  of  any  oracle  of  wisdom 
within  the  hidden  depths  of  the  mind.  We 
are  all  aware  of  the  activity  of  these  under- 
currents of  reason  in  our  thinking.  We  reach 
certain  conclusions  without  being  conscious  of 
the  process  of  reasoning  connected  with  them. 
They  are  so  little  a  part  of  us  that  they 
seem  prepared  for  us  rather  than  produced 
by  us. 

We  find  ourselves,  for  instance,  face  to  face 
with  a  new  situation  presenting  problems  which 
we  have  never  before  considered.  A  quick  de- 
cision must  be  made.  There  is  no  time  for 
mature  deHberation.  It  is  necessary  to  judge 
of  the   trustworthiness   of  a   man,   or   of  the 


10  A  DEFENCE  OF  PREJUDICE 

wisdom  of  a  business  venture,  or  of  the  prob- 
able success  or  failure  of  a  proposed  policy. 
The  circumstances  force  us  to  make  what  may 
seem  to  be  a  snap  judgment.  To  state  a  defi- 
nite reason  as  the  ground  of  our  decision  is 
ahogether  impossible.  Behind  the  decision  is 
a  play  of  subtle  forces  producing  a  certain  total 
impression  which  cannot  be  expressed  in  words, 
and  which  stubbornly  resists  all  attempts  on 
our  part  to  analyze  it.  It  is  not  amenable  to 
the  control  of  the  reason,  nor  does  it  appear 
in  any  form  which  enters  as  a  familiar  factor 
in  the  usual  processes  of  our  thinking.  It  is 
a  prejudice,  if  you  please — a  judgment  whose 
force  we  are  constrained  to  recognize  but  whose 
truth  we  cannot  possibly  prove.  It  is  sufficient 
to  provoke  action,  but  it  is  not  adequate  to  jus- 
tify itself.  In  such  a  case  the  subconscious  ac- 
tivities seem  to  conserve  the  essential  elements 
of  our  conscious  experiences.  A  man  with  a 
wide  knowledge  of  his  fellows  has  accumulated, 
day  after  day,  year  after  year,  a  wealth  of  expe- 
rience which  becomes  a  part  of  himself — not 
consciously  formulated  in  maxims  of  wisdom, 
but  assimilated  and  stored  in  the  deep  recesses 


A  DEFENCE  OF  PREJUDICE  ii 

of  his  nature.  In  every  one  of  us  there  is  a 
high  potential  of  this  kind  of  unformulated  ex- 
perience. It  represents  the  abiding  mood  and 
general  disposition  of  the  man;  it  is  a  sort  of 
diflfused  sagacity  which  eludes  all  attempts  at 
definition.  However,  when  occasion  offers  it 
becomes  at  once  active  and  efficient.  It  di- 
rects our  purposes  and  gives  a  final  cast  to 
our  judgments.  We  trust  it  instinctively  and 
yet  withal  blindly;  but  who  shall  say  unreason- 
ably ? 

Our  subconscious  activities,  however,  not 
only  serve  to  mediate  a  quick  decision,  but  they 
tend  as  well  to  precipitate  a  delayed  decision. 
One  finds  himself  again  and  again  confronted 
with  a  situation  wherein  he  is  torn  now  in  one 
direction,  and  now  in  another.  The  arguments 
pro  and  con  are  nicely  balanced.  Out  of  the 
bewilderment  of  mind,  or  even  of  an  agony  of 
spirit,  there  will  come  a  settling  of  the  will 
toward  one  of  the  rival  alternatives,  and  a  de- 
cided dip  of  the  scales.  In  such  an  experience 
the  mind  is  aware  of  a  certain  compulsion  which 
seems  to  transcend  its  conscious  autonomy. 
There  is  a  welling  up  of  the  subconscious  stream 


12  A  DEFENCE  OF  PREJUDICE 

from  its  source  in  the  depths  of  that  buried  Hfe 
which  makes  every  man  a  mystery  to  himself. 
At  times  the  most  momentous  decisions  of  Hfe 
are  reached  through  the  mediation  of  these  in- 
fluences which,  while  they  may  not  be  con- 
trary to  reason,  nevertheless  transcend  it. 

It  is  then  that  a  man  seems  to  be  a  pas- 
sive spectator.  Something  within  acts  for  him. 
He  finds  himself  determined  by  a  deep-seated 
prejudice,  as  he  is  constrained  to  confess,  if  he 
ever  pauses  to  reflect  upon  it  at  all.  Is  not 
one's  profession,  or  hobby,  or  the  cause  to 
which  he  may  give  his  life,  or  his  absorbing 
pursuits,  a  revelation  in  some  degree  at  least 
of  his  most  deeply  rooted  prejudices  .?  But  will 
any  one  maintain,  however,  that  he  would  wish 
to  be  freed  from  all  such  influences .?  Are  they 
not  an  integral  part  of  his  being  .?  And  are  not 
the  hidden  powers  of  his  nature  after  all  the 
measure  of  the  man  ? 

There  is  still  another  function  which  our 
prejudices  fulfil;  they  serve  to  produce  the 
overtones  of  character.  It  is  the  overtone  that 
gives  a  distinctive  quality  to  sound;  and,  in  a 
similar  manner,  character  may  be  regarded  as 


A  DEFENCE  OF  PREJUDICE  13 

having  its  peculiar  timbre.  There  is  a  certain 
ring  about  a  man's  character — it  is  true  or 
false,  pleasing  or  unpleasing,  harmonious  or 
discordant,  as  the  case  may  be.  Reason  may 
determine  the  tone,  but  it  is  the  prejudice  which 
often  produces  the  overtone.  We  love  a  man 
on  account  of  his  prejudices;  we  hate  him  also 
for  a  like  reason.  Strip  a  man  of  his  preju- 
dices, and  only  the  commonplace  remains.  In- 
dividuality is  the  projection  of  our  prejudices. 
Remove  the  prejudices  and  the  individual  is 
merged  again  with  the  crowd.  He  is  only  one 
of  many.  He  no  longer  appeals  to  our  imagina- 
tion. There  is  no  more  of  interest  or  charm  or 
power  about  him.  Character  without  a  dash 
of  prejudice  is  insipid.  A  man  without  a  fair 
amount  of  prejudice  in  his  nature  always  lacks 
intensity  of  conviction.  There  may  be  a  glow 
of  intellectual  light,  but  there  is  a  conspicuous 
absence  of  fire  and  driving  power.  There  is 
often  a  certain  judicial  poise  of  mind  which 
reveals  itself  in  a  tolerance  that  is  an  indica- 
tion of  weakness  rather  than  strength.  Such  a 
man  never  lets  himself  go.  He  always  sees 
two  sides  to  every  question,  and  can  never  com- 


14  A  DEFENCE  OF  PREJUDICE 

mit  himself  to  the  one  or  the  other.     Freedom 
from  prejudice  is  often  indicated  by  a  vacil- 
lation which  is  pitifully  weak  and  ineffectual. 
What  distinct  and   striking  impression  would 
the  character  of  Carlyle  make  upon  us,  were 
it   to   be   separated   completely  from   his  prej- 
udices ?   or  would   it  be  possible  to  read  Bos- 
well's  Johnson,  if  the  work  were  to  be  expur- 
gated of  everything  which  savors  of  a  prejudice  .? 
It  is  also  the  prejudices  underlying  character, 
the  prejudices  of  good  sense  and  of  good  taste, 
which  often  operate  as  a  safeguard  against  the 
temptations  of  the  reason;    for  reason  has  its 
temptations  as  well  as  the  passions — not  true 
reason,  but  the  subtle  casuistry  of  reason.     It 
is  easy  in  the  times  of  extraordinary  pressure 
to  convince  oneself  that  the  worse  cause  is  really 
the   better,  that   darkness    is    light,    and   light 
darkness.     Then  it  is  that  the  prejudices  which 
are    deeply   grounded   in   our    nature    tend    to 
steady  us.     It  is  possible  by  plausible  sophistries 
to  justify  many  a  course  of  action  wherein  our 
clear  vision  has  been  dimmed   by  the  allure- 
ments of  sense,  of  selfish  interests,  of  greed  and 
ambition.     But    at   the    last   we    shrink   from 


A  DEFENCE  OF  PREJUDICE  15 

doing  the  very  thing  which  we  had  proposed, 
and  which  we  had  rationally  defended.  There 
is  something  within  which  gives  us  pause.  We 
are  saved  in  spite  of  ourselves,  even  in  spite 
of  reason  itself.  We  find  ourselves  under  the 
restraint  of  some  undefinable  feeling,  some 
fancy,  a  prejudice  indeed,  which  calls  to  us 
from  the  mass  of  old-fashioned  principles 
which  we  had  thought  forever  banished,  but 
which  the  sophistication  induced  by  an  inti- 
mate experience  with  the  world  had  not  wholly 
eradicated.  No  power  which  operates  upon  the 
human  mind  is  stronger  or  more  permanent  in 
its  control  than  this  prejudice  of  honor.  There 
are  certain  persons  who  seem  to  be  almost  per- 
versely conscientious;  their  native  shrewdness 
and  the  stirrings  of  the  egoistic  instincts  are 
constantly  overbalanced  by  their  sense  of  hon- 
esty and  the  overpowering  compulsion  of  their 
altruistic  impulses. 

It  is  in  the  transition  times,  when  reason  is 
obscured  by  interest  or  extinguished  by  pas- 
sion, that  the  commanding  voice  of  prejudice 
enters  its  caveat  to  which  it  is  well  to  give 
heed,   and   instant  obedience.      Prejudice  thus 


i6  A  DEFENCE  OF  PREJUDICE 

proves  in  many  instances  to  be  a  saving  grace. 
It  is  the  instinctive  morality  after  all  which  is 
the  supreme  test  of  character.     There  is  a  cal- 
culated virtue,  a  wisdom  always  seeking  to  be 
justified    of  her    children,  which   nevertheless 
does  not  reveal  the  man  as  he  really  is.     His 
innate    tastes    and    propensities,  however,  the 
whole  body  of   his    unreasoned    predilections 
and  impulses  which  are  the  natural  soil  of  prej- 
udice, serve  to  disclose  a  man  to  himself  and 
to  others  as  the  very  mirror  of  reality  itself. 
If  human  nature  were  devoid  of  prejudice,  the 
heroics  of  morality  would   never   be   written. 
That  impulsive  nobility  which  is  the  flower  of 
character   is   the  kind   of  prejudice  which   at 
times  flies  in  the  face  of  reason,  following  the 
irresistible  lead  of  its  own  nature  in  the  scorn 
of  consequence.    But  is  it  not  in  turn  approved 
of  reason  itself,  when  we  come  to  pronounce  a 
deliberate   judgment   upon    its    moral   worth .? 
The    prejudice  which    outstrips    reason    may 
nevertheless    draw    reason     after    her    in  her 
flight,  so  that  the  two  may    eventually    meet 
in    mutual    recognition    and    harmony.      The 
prejudice,  therefore,  which  transcends  reason. 


A  DEFENCE  OF   PREJUDICE  17 

or  which  anticipates  reason,  or  which  is  in 
secret  born  of  reason,  is  not,  necessarily  con- 
trary to  reason,  but  may  be  rationally  de- 
fended and  justified. 


II 

THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  OPPOSITION 

^TpHE  University  of  Berlin  is  celebrating  this 
autumn,  of  the  year  1910,  its  one  hundredth 
anniversary.  The  beginnings  of  this  educational 
enterprise  were  intimately  associated  vi^ith  its 
pioneer  professor  and  rector — the  patriot,  phi- 
losopher, and  teacher,  Johann  Gottlieb  Fichte, 
who  by  his  labors  and  personality  gave  to  the 
university  the  early  promise  of  distinction  which 
through  the  course  of  its  history  it  has  so  brill- 
iantly realized.  There  is  a  phase  of  the  philos- 
ophy of  Fichte  which  profoundly  affected  the 
moral  traditions,  not  only  of  the  university,  but 
of  the  German  people  generally,  and  which 
should  prove  exceedingly  suggestive  to  all  who 
may  be  concerned  with  a  practical  philosophy  of 
Hfe. 

This  idea  of  Fichte's  I  would  characterize  as 
the  philosophy  of  opposition.  His  theory  was 
born  of  experience,  and  through  bitter  years  of 
adversity  and  deprivation  he  evolved  the  car- 


THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  OPPOSITION   19 

dinal  doctrine  of  his  practical  creed: — that,  in 
the  making  of  a  man,  power  is  born  of  oppo- 
sition; that  struggle  begets  strength;  that  re- 
sistance provokes  vigor  of  body  and  of  spirit; 
and  that  the  very  obstacles  to  progress  make 
progress  possible.  This  was  not  merely  the 
teaching  of  the  class-room.  It  became  the 
dominant  note  of  his  stirring  appeal  to  the  Ger- 
man nation.  By  his  challenge  of  circumstance, 
Fichte  sought  to  arouse  his  countrymen  from 
the  torpor  of  humiliation  which  had  been  in- 
duced by  the  disasters  of  the  Napoleonic  wars. 
In  his  "Addresses  to  the  German  Nation"  he 
endeavored  to  awaken  the  spirit  of  the  people  to 
an  appreciation  of  the  fundamental  truth  that 
the  distress  of  the  nation  is  the  opportunity  of 
the  patriot;  and  that  out  of  the  depths  of  adver- 
sity it  is  possible  for  a  people  to  arise  to  a  new 
life  of  strength  and  powder.  In  this  he  appeared 
not  only  as  a  priest  to  the  national  conscience, 
but  as  a  prophet  of  the  nation's  destiny. 

Fichte's  philosophy,  however,  is  not  for  the 
past  alone,  nor  exclusively  for  the  German  peo- 
ple; but  now,  after  a  century,  and  in  reference 
to  the  present-day  problems  of  life,  we  may 


20   THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  OPPOSITION 

well  pause  to  consider  the  kindly  offices  of  op- 
position in  the  evolution  of  human  capacity 
and  character.  Human  nature  is  the  same  the 
world  over;  and,  quite  irrespective  of  the  age 
or  of  the  land  in  which  one  may  happen  to  live, 
it  remains  universally  true  that  man  is  born  to 
struggle,  not  only  for  what  he  may  wish  to 
possess,  but  also  for  what  he  is  fitted  to  become. 
We  are  in  this  world  to  fight.  Under  what 
banner  does  one  draw  his  sword .?  That  is  the 
question  of  chief  interest  and  concern. 

The  earliest  consciousness  of  self,  the  vague 
impression  of  one's  individuality  as  distinct  from 
the  world  about  him,  comes  to  the  child,  when 
for  the  first  time  he  becomes  aware  of  the  bar- 
riers of  his  young  life.  As  he  puts  forth  his 
hand,  and  feels  the  first  shock  of  opposition  as  a 
check  upon  his  free  activity,  then  and  there  he 
experiences  the  first  throb  of  personality.  The 
"I,"  the  heart  of  his  being,  the  inner  self,  is  re- 
vealed by  the  resistance  of  the  things  or  forces 
about  him  which  he  must  encounter,  and 
which  he  recognizes  instinctively  as  something 
different  from  the  self  within,  and  never  to  be 
confused  with  it.     The  power  of  self-assertion 


THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  OPPOSITION   21 

is  provoked  by  the  very  powder  which  opposes 
the  inner  self  and  seeks  to  overcome  it. 

And  later  in  life  there  often  comes  a  second 
awakening  to  a  more  profound  sense  of  person- 
ality, when  we  find  ourselves  amidst  a  storm  of 
opposition  which  emerges  in  some  significant 
crisis  of  our  experience.  Such  a  crisis  may 
mark  not  only  a  new  birth  of  power,  but  also 
a  new  order  of  being.  It  is  often  a  moral 
renaissance.  Under  the  fire  of  opposition,  in 
the  collision  of  opinion,  a  new  spirit  is  quick- 
ened, daring  great  things  and  capable  of  great 
things.  In  an  experience  of  such  a  nature, 
one  realizes  that  he  is  something  more  than 
a  human  machine;  that  he  is  not  a  puppet 
nor  a  slave;  nor  a  being,  merely  to  feed  and 
sleep  and  play;  nor  a  creature  caught  in  the 
toils  of  circumstance,  but  a  man  and  as  such 
bound  to  recognize  the  truth  that  man's  voca- 
tion is  a  call  to  freedom  and  to  duty. 

It  is  well  for  us  if  we  early  recognize  the  fact 
that  every  difficulty  in  life  is  a  challenge.  Is 
there  something  within  the  man  to  meet  it,  or 
not  ?  That  is  the  question  which  every  one 
must  ask  himself.     Upon  his  response  his  fate 


22    THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  OPPOSITION 

is  fixed.  Obstacles  suggest  opportunities,  if 
they  are  only  regarded  in  their  true  light;  they 
put  a  man  upon  his  mettle,  stimulate  his  en- 
ergies, strengthen  his  power  of  resistance,  in- 
crease his  art  of  resource,  and  inspire  a  spirit  of 
courage  and  determination.  If  there  is  any 
latent  power,  resistance  discovers  it.  The  line 
of  least  resistance,  on  the  other  hand,  can  never 
be  the  line  of  development  and  of  progress;  for 
then  there  is  nothing  to  call  forth  hidden  pos- 
sibilities. But  resistance  creates  necessarily  a 
demand  for  new  methods  and  devices,  new 
processes,  new  inventions,  the  conservation  of 
forces,  and  the  more  considerate  direction  of 
effort. 

Not  only,  however,  is  progress  assured  by 
overcoming  resistance,  and  in  spite  of  it,  but 
resistance  itself  is  an  essential  factor  in  prog- 
ress. No  leverage  is  possible  without  the  re- 
sisting medium  of  a  fulcrum;  so  that  without 
resistance  it  would  be  impossible  for  us  to  get  a 
foothold  upon  the  earth  even  in  the  ordinary  act 
of  walking.  We  know  that  it  is  not  the  strength 
of  the  arm  only,  but  the  stubborn  stuff  of  the 
bow  which  speeds  the  arrow.     It  is  a  common- 


THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  OPPOSITION  23 

place,  moreover,  of  electrical  theory,  that  a  cur- 
rent of  electricity,  passing  freely  through  its 
conducting  wire,  gives  no  visible  evidence  of  its 
existence;  but  w^hen  it  meets  the  resistance  of 
the  carbon  points,  it  bursts  into  light.  The 
illumination  results  from  the  opposition  offered 
by  the  resisting  medium,  and  this  generates  heat 
of  such  intensity  as  to  become  incandescent  and 
the  bearer  of  light.  In  the  v^orld  also  of  human 
affairs  and  relations,  much  of  the  light  has  its 
source  in  the  clash  of  opposing  forces,  and  the 
struggle  to  overcome  resistance. 

Life  is  a  game,  v^e  say;  and  from  time  to  time 
we  urge  one  another  to  play  the  game  fair  and 
to  a  finish.  In  this  reference,  we  must  remem- 
ber that  the  zest  of  a  game  consists  in  one's  skill 
to  overcome  opposition.  An  opponent  who 
fails  to  call  forth  our  best  endeavor  deadens 
interest  in  the  sport,  whatever  it  may  be.  A 
one-sided  contest  means  loose  playing  and  flag- 
ging zeal;  on  the  other  hand,  the  more  skilled 
and  alert  an  adversary,  the  more  resourceful 
and  aggressive  our  game.  In  the  contests  of 
life  where  there  is  no  worthy  competitor,  there 
can  be  but  slight  achievement  and  little  glory. 


24   THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  OPPOSITION 

The  uphill  game,  however,  which  is  won 
through  no  adventitious  aid  of  favor  or  fortune, 
but  solely  upon  its  merits  and  by  stubborn  per- 
sistence, brings  a  glow  of  satisfaction  which  is 
wholly  unknown  in  the  triumph  of  an  easy  vic- 
tory. We  do  not  care  to  play  with  a  novice,  we 
demand  the  rigor  of  the  game,  and  free  scope 
for  the  display  of  our  powers.  It  is  possible, 
therefore,  to  meet  the  opposition  which  life  holds 
for  us,  in  the  spirit  of  adventure,  and  ride  forth 
to  meet  the  foe  with  high  hope  and  the  joy  of 
battle  in  our  heart. 

This  idea,  however,  which  would  represent 
life  as  a  game,  does  not  adequately  portray  the 
true  philosophy  of  opposition.  The  game  con- 
ception of  life  emphasizes  perhaps  too  much  the 
idea  of  victory  or  defeat;  for  to  overcome  in 
life  is  not  merely  to  win  a  victory,  but  it  is 
rather  to  gain  a  mastery  over  the  powers  which 
oppose  us.  And  complete  mastery  is  possible 
only  when  we  learn  the  secret  of  transforming 
opposing  powers  into  co-operative  agencies  in 
serving  our  needs  and  ministering  to  our  pur- 
poses. There  is  a  savage  superstition  that 
every  foe  killed  in  battle  surrenders  his  spirit 


THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  OPPOSITION   25 

of  valor  and  courage  to  the  one  who  slays  him. 
In  some  such  manner  we  gain  in  strength  when 
we  can  so  subdue  opposing  forces  as  to  make 
them  contributory  to  our  resources  of  energy, 
and  thus  in  a  sense  a  part  of  us.  All  conquests 
in  life  come  through  the  ability  to  dominate 
circumstance.  We  are  not  passive  beings,  to 
become  the  play  of  nature's  forces  about  us,  but 
free  agents,  with  the  power  of  initiative  and  the 
will  to  compel  these  forces  to  do  our  bidding. 

The  two  conquests  which  are  of  supreme  sig- 
nificance for  us,  which  we  must  achieve,  or  else 
face  inevitable  failure  in  life,  are  the  conquest 
of  knowledge  and  the  conquest  of  character. 
Our  primal  limitation  throughout  the  various 
phases  of  experience  is  that  of  ignorance. 
When  we  find  ourselves  in  any  situation  where 
the  nature  of  the  forces  in  opposition  to  us  is 
unknown,  such  forces  are  not  only  an  obstacle 
to  progress,  but  may  prove  a  most  serious 
danger  as  well.  It  is  not  simply  that  all  effort 
is  obviously  futile  under  such  circumstances, 
but  it  is  quite  likely  also  to  be  disastrous,  inas- 
much as  our  very  striving  may  become  our 
undoing.     But  when  the  nature  of  the  powers 


26  THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  OPPOSITION 

arrayed  against  us  is  adequately  discerned,  it  is 
then  possible,  not  only  to  combat  them  suc- 
cessfully, but  also  to  direct  them  to  our  obvious 
advantage. 

The  life  of  every  individual  may  be  appropri- 
ately represented  by  an  inner  circle  of  knowl- 
edge, placed  within  a  vast  outer  circle  of  the 
unknown.  Growth,  progress,  attainment,  all 
are  possible  only  when  there  is  an  ever-in- 
creasing expansion  of  this  inner  circle,  tran- 
scending its  own  limits,  and  appropriating  more 
and  more  of  the  outlying  region  within  the  area 
of  its  comprehension  and  appreciation. 

Undiscovered  countries  forever  lie  beyond  the 
confines  of  our  understanding,  and  we  feel  un- 
der compulsion  to  push  forward  the  frontiers 
and  possess  these  new  lands  in  the  name  of 
knowledge.  The  process  of  transforming  the 
unknown  into  the  known  is  life,  education,  de- 
velopment. It  is  a  process  essentially  of  assimi- 
lation. It  consists  in  making  knowledge  a  part 
of  our  own  being;  for  knowledge  is  not  pri- 
marily a  possession,  it  is  a  power;  it  is  not  a 
stored  mind,  it  is  trained  skill;  it  is  not  a  mass 
of  information,  but  a  living  spirit.     In  this  sense 


THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  OPPOSITION   27 

we  overcome  the  world,  therefore,  when  we  so 
comprehend  the  nature  of  its  powers  as  to  make 
them  our  own,  and  compel  them  to  obey  our 
will. 

We  speak  of  "the  world  in  which  we  live," 
or  of  "the  world  which  is  about  us."  These 
phrases,  however,  are  quite  misleading,  if  they 
are  taken  literally.  "The  world  in  which  we 
live"  is  in  reahty  only  so  much  of  the  great 
world,  after  all,  as  lives  in  us;  it  is  that  which 
we  understand,  and  which  our  knowledge  com- 
mands. It  would  be  truer  to  fact,  therefore,  if 
we  should  say  that  the  world  is  in  us,  rather 
than  we  in  the  world.  A  million  persons  live  in 
one  and  the  same  city,  and  yet  their  various  pur- 
suits, occupations,  and  professions  form  dis- 
tinctly separate  worlds  of  activity  and  of  in- 
terest. Each  one  makes  his  own  world;  for 
knowledge  creates  as  well  as  discovers.  Con- 
sequently one's  world  is  large  or  small,  as  one 
chooses.  Its  boundaries  are  determined  by  that 
area  which  one's  intelligence  controls,  and  which 
one  has  reclaimed  from  the  waste  stretches  of 
ignorance.  Our  world  is  simply  the  sphere  in 
which  our  skill  and  proficiency  find  play,  and 


28   THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  OPPOSITION 

in  which  we  speak  with  authority.  The  build- 
ing of  such  a  world  is  no  light  task.  The  pur- 
suit of  knowledge  is  proverbially  difficult,  and 
yet  in  the  struggle  for  it  we  are  fighting  for  a 
kingdom. 

The  progress  of  knowledge  is  illustrated  not 
only  in  the  development  of  individual  capacity 
and  efficiency,  but  as  well  in  the  history  of 
humanity  as  a  whole.  The  progress  of  civiliza- 
tion has  been  a  continuous  process  of  enlarging 
the  area  of  commanding  knowledge  generation 
after  generation.  By  the  toil  of  the  ages,  the 
conquests  of  human  thought  have  been  steadily 
maintained.  Nature,  however,  does  not  re- 
veal her  secrets  gratuitously;  but  they  must  be 
wrested  from  her.  For  nature,  like  the  king- 
dom of  heaven,  suffereth  violence,  and  the  vio- 
lent take  it  by  force.  Man  has  invaded  nature 
from  many  sides,  and  has  established  over 
every  conquered  region  his  sovereign  control. 
Even  that  which  lies  beyond  the  range  of  his 
observation  must  sooner  or  later  surrender  to 
the  bold  attack  or  patient  siege  of  his  subduing 
thought.  There  is  a  whole  universe  of  super- 
sensible   phenomena,    a   world   of  the   all-per- 


THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  OPPOSITION    29 

vading  ether,  a  world  of  magnetic  fields  and 
electric  waves,  a  world  of  ultra-violet  rays,  of 
radio-active  forces,  of  ions  and  electrons,  of 
ideoplasm  and  entelechies,  a  world  which  eye 
has  not  seen,  nor  ear  heard,  but  which  the 
mind  of  man  has  penetrated,  and  brought  under 
its  control.  Man  possesses  the  earth,  and  his 
title  to  it  is  knowledge.  His  understanding  of 
the  laws  of  nature  is  a  patent  of  proprietary 
right  over  the  domain  of  nature. 

However,  mere  knowledge  of  itself  is  not 
power.  To  convert  knowledge  into  power  there 
must  be  ceaseless  activity,  and  a  wise  direction 
of  all  one's  energies.  With  every  effort  of  will 
which  man  puts  forth  to  command  and  human- 
ize his  environment,  there  is  an  expansion  of 
the  inner  circle  of  personality  as  well  as  that  of 
knowledge.  Wherever  resistance  is  overcome, 
limitations  removed,  or  difficulties  transferred 
into  advantages,  there  is  a  conquest  of  char- 
acter, and  the  growth  of  a  larger  soul  in  the 
process  of  appropriating  to  itself  a  larger  world. 
When  the  circle  of  life  contracts,  it  is  evident 
that  the  world  is  encroaching  upon  the  domain 
of  personality;    but  when  it  expands,  we  may 


30  THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  OPPOSITION 

be  sure  that  the  power  of  personaHty  has  as- 
serted itself,  and  is  in  the  way  of  overcoming 
the  world.  An  eternal  warfare  is  waging  be- 
tween the  necessity  of  nature  on  the  one  hand, 
and  the  manifestation  of  the  free  spirit  of  man 
on  the  other.  In  this  contest  man  has  always 
the  advantage,  for  he  wields  the  weapon  of 
thought,  against  which  no  foe  can  prevail. 

In  his  philosophy  of  life,  Fichte  regards  the 
material  world,  the  course  of  its  events,  its 
routine  of  universal  law,  the  every-day  circum- 
stance and  commonplace  of  experience,  as 
merely  the  stage-setting  of  the  great  moral 
drama  of  life.  "Our  world,"  he  says,  "is  the 
sensualized  material  of  our  duty.  What  com- 
pels us  to  yield  belief  in  the  reality  of  the  world 
is  a  moral  force, — the  only  force  that  is  possible 
for  a  free  being."  Every  historian  is  bound  to 
regard  the  world,  in  a  certain  sense  at  least, 
from  this  Fichtean  point  of  view;  for  the  end 
of  history  is  primarily  the  display  of  character, 
and  the  office  of  the  historian  is  essentially  that 
of  a  psychologist  who  deals  with  human  docu- 
ments. All  institutions — social,  political,  and 
religious — represent  the  objectified  will  of  man. 


THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  OPPOSITION   31 

They  make  permanent  record  of  habits,  of  con- 
troversies and  conflicts,  of  received  opinion  and 
estabHshed  procedure.  The  events  of  life  are 
of  sHght  significance  which  fail  to  show  the 
good  or  evil  of  human  nature,  its  weakness  or 
its  strength,  its  noble  or  ignoble  strain.  Even 
the  work  of  a  man's  hands  should  give  some 
evidence  of  his  quahty  of  mind,  and  disposi- 
tion of  heart,  some  intimation  of  his  purpose 
and  desire,  of  his  struggles,  of  his  defeats  and 
victories. 

The  forces  of  nature  with  all  the  material 
elements  of  the  world  subserve  therefore  the 
ends  of  a  higher  order,  the  moral  order,  and 
they  possess  for  us  a  final  significance  only  in 
so  far  as  they  directly  or  indirectly  fulfil  this 
function.  All  things  have  a  meaning  for  us, 
according  to  their  relation  to  man,  and  man 
has  a  meaning  according  to  the  position  which 
he  is  able  to  take,  and  maintain,  amidst  the 
obligations  and  responsibilities  of  his  surround- 
ings. 

For  a  man's  life,  however,  to  have  a  moral 
significance,  the  inner  circle  of  power  should 
expand  in  such  a  manner  as  to  enclose  within 


32  THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  OPPOSITION 

its  bounds  of  control  other  selves  as  well  as 
other  things.  The  nature  of  man  is  such  that 
he  does  not  develop  normally  in  solitude;  for  it 
is  indeed  true  that  character  is  formed  in  the 
stream  of  the  v^^orld.  While  man  has  to  con- 
tend against  the  forces  of  nature  and  subdue 
them  to  his  will,  the  supreme  test  comes  when 
the  conflict  is  with  human  nature,  with  another 
personality  like  himself,  which  stands  opposed 
to  him,  urging  equal  rights  and  equal  privileges. 
The  gospel  of  self-assertion  therefore  must  be 
tempered  by  a  due  consideration  of  others. 

When  we  urge  the  rights  of  freedom  and  of 
conscience  for  ourselves,  we  are  constrained  in 
consistency  to  recognize  similar  rights  for  others 
whose  wills  may  clash  with  ours.  The  rules  of 
the  game  are  made  impartially  for  all  comers, 
and  not  for  any  individual  or  for  the  few.  The 
rights  of  an  individual,  however  particular  they 
may  be  in  any  specific  instance,  can  be  justified 
solely  by  proving  that  they  rest  upon  some  uni- 
versally valid  ground.  What  I  can  in  justice 
claim  for  myself,  and  if  necessary  should  fight 
to  maintain,  I  must  in  all  honor  allow  even  in 
my  thoughts  to  any  other  human  being  simi- 


THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  OPPOSITION    33 

larly  situated.  Life  is  not  a  struggle  for  ex- 
istence in  which  one  wins  necessarily  at  the 
expense  of  another's  loss,  where  one  survives 
while  the  remnant  is  pushed  to  the  wall.  This 
is  a  poor  view  of  life;  it  is  the  animal  view  of 
Hfe;  it  is  anti-social,  and  inhuman.  There  is 
no  relation  between  man  and  man  in  which 
some  reciprocity  of  advantage  may  not  be  se- 
cured, and  it  is  our  paramount  duty  to  discover 
the  means  to  this  end,  and  cause  it  to  prevail. 
The  most  signal  victories  in  life  are  gained,  not 
by  conquering  others,  but  conquering  for  them. 
We  overcome,  not  by  excluding  our  fellow-men 
from  the  circle  of  self-realization,  but  by  en- 
larging that  circle  so  as  to  include  others  within 
the  area  of  common  interests  and  sympathies. 
To  convert  an  antagonist  into  an  ally  is  the 
consummate  art  of  diplomacy.  To  conclude  a 
wise  treaty  between  two  nations  upon  terms  of 
mutual  benefit  is  of  greater  service  to  one's 
country  than  winning  a  battle,  or  sinking  an 
enemy's  fleet.  The  supreme  victory  is  that 
which  can  be  shared.  In  human  affairs  the 
conquests  of  co-operation  alone  are  worthy. 
Through  them  the  individual  creates  for  him- 


34    THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  OPPOSITION 

self  an  empire  of  power  whose  boundaries  are 
determined  solely  by  the  number  of  lives  which 
are  brought  within  the  range  of  his  care  and 
concern.  One  who  is  conscious  that  he  holds 
his  power  in  trust  will  not  be  likely  to  use  it 
arbitrarily,  or  tyrannically,  but  with  justice  to 
all,  and  to  the  one  end, — that  of  the  common 
good. 

The  relations  of  life  approach  the  normal  as 
individual  progress  is  identified  with  some  form 
of  social  welfare,  and  the  prosperity  of  one  be- 
comes the  good  fortune  of  the  many.  When 
the  conditions  of  society,  however,  tend  to  array 
man  against  man,  class  against  class,  and  life 
becomes  a  veritable  struggle  for  existence,  then 
all  co-operative  endeavor  must  cease,  which 
means  always  an  abnormal  state  of  human  re- 
lations, and  the  deterioration  of  social  and  na- 
tional life. 

In  the  Germany  of  Fichte's  age,  foreign  in- 
vasion and  oppression  had  restricted  the  free 
spirit  of  high  endeavor,  and  had  discouraged 
all  effort  save  that  of  the  bare  preserving  of 
one's  existence.  Fichte  felt  that  under  such 
conditions  progress  either  of  the  individual  or 


THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  OPPOSITION   35 

of  the  nation  was  wholly  out  of  the  question; 
that  co-operative  effort  would  be  unavaiHng, 
and  striving  for  individual  advantage  would  be 
ignoble. 

These  sentiments  he  expressed  to  his  class  at 
the  close  of  a  lecture  one  memorable  day  in  the 
year  18 13.  He  spoke  to  them  with  a  grim  fer- 
vor concerning  the  impending  danger  to  their 
country  in  the  presence  of  an  invading  army, 
and  the  patriot's  duty  to  respond  to  the  call  of 
need;  then  he  concluded  his  appeal  with  these 
ringing  words,  which  proved  to  be  his  valedic- 
tory to  his  students,  and  to  the  German  people: 
"This  course  of  lectures  will  be  suspended  un- 
til the  end  of  this  campaign.  We  will  resume 
them  in  a  free  country  or  die  in  the  attempt  to 
recover  her  freedom." 

Such  was  the  spirit  of  one  whose  philosophy 
of  life  is  most  strikingly  illustrated  in  his  pro- 
found conviction  that  "a  nation  becomes  a 
nation  through  common  struggle." 


Ill 

THE  PARADOX  OF  RESEARCH 

"DECAUSE  this  is  a  practical  age,  and  also 
pre-eminently  an  age  of  extensive  investi- 
gation, it  might  seem  that  the  chief  incentive 
to  research  should  be  the  possibility  of  adding 
to  the  store  of  practical  knowledge,  and  thereby 
increasing  the  general  efficiency  of  human  en- 
deavor. But,  as  we  read  the  history  of  scientific 
discovery,  from  the  first  strivings  of  primitive 
thought  to  the  present  time,  we  are  impressed 
with  the  fact  that  utility  is  not  always  the 
mother  of  invention. 

This  is  the  paradox  which  confronts  us 
throughout  the  whole  course  of  the  develop- 
ment of  scientific  thought: — If  man  questions 
nature  for  the  purpose  merely  of  wresting  those 
secrets  which  shall  minister  directly  to  his 
needs  or  comfort,  he  fails  to  attain  his  end, 
or  he  attains  it  only  in  a  meagre  way;  but  if, 
on  the  contrary,  he  goes  to  nature  with  a  desire 
to  know  her  secrets  for  their  own  sake,  the 

36 


THE  PARADOX  OF  RESEARCH        37 

revelation  often  brings  with  it  a  wealth  of 
knowledge  which,  in  turn,  admits  of  untold 
applications  as  regards  the  practical  conven- 
iences of  life.  If  utiHty  is  the  sole  incentive 
to  research,  the  results  will  range  on  a  lower 
level;  if,  however,  utility  is  forgotten  in  the 
passion  to  get  at  the  heart  of  things  for  their 
own  sake,  it  sometimes  surprises  us  upon  the 
way.  And  the  reason  of  this  is  obvious;  for 
utility,  in  all  practical  relations,  results  from  the 
application  of  certain  underlying  principles  to 
the  concrete  problems  of  life.  The  more  cen- 
tral and  comprehensive  the  principle,  the  wider 
will  be  its  scope  of  practical  application.  The 
principles  most  fertile  in  products  of  utiHty  are 
often  most  deeply  hidden.  They  lie  at  the  cen- 
tre of  things;  it  is  only  the  most  searching  in- 
quiry which  will  disclose  them.  With  utility  as 
the  sole  guide  to  research,  the  mind  naturally 
ranges  over  the  surface  of  things.  The  more 
profound  levels  seem  far  removed  from  practi- 
cal considerations  and  results. 

The  practical,  however  simple  it  may  be,  is 
always  the  embodiment  of  some  theory.  The 
telephone,  the  incandescent  light,  the  electric 

130499 


38        THE  PARADOX  OF  RESEARCH 

car — these  are  simply  the  concrete  expression 
of  a  great  electro-magnetic  theory.  The  bridge 
swinging  free  and  secure  over  the  stream,  self- 
supported  by  the  exact  calculation  of  its  stress 
and  strain,  is  merely  a  set  of  mechanical  laws 
objectified.  If  you  start  in  your  research  with 
the  sole  object  of  solving  a  specific  problem  of 
practical  significance  merely,  the  result,  if  suc- 
cessful, is  limited  in  all  probability  to  the  special 
end  in  view;  on  the  other  hand,  if  you  set 
yourself  the  larger  problem  of  investigating  cer- 
tain phenomena  which  have  peculiarly  attracted 
your  interest  for  the  purpose  of  discovering 
their  nature  and  understanding  their  laws,  then 
the  revelation  of  a  comprehensive  principle 
carries  with  it  a  whole  world  of  possibilities. 
While  a  principle  is  one,  it  comprehends  the 
many;  for  it  admits  of  a  multiplicity  of  appli- 
cation which  knows  no  limit.  Nature  thus  sets 
a  premium  upon  the  study  of  her  mysteries  for 
their  own  sake. 

There  is  such  a  thing  as  disinterested  knowl- 
edge as  well  as  disinterested  benevolence.  There 
is  a  scorn  of  consequence  in  the  intellectual  world 
as  well  as  in  the  moral  which  tends  in  like  man- 


THE  PARADOX  OF  RESEARCH        39 

ner  to  provoke  unhesitating  approval  and  ad- 
miration. There  is  a  persistent  spirit  in  the 
pursuit  of  truth,  which  is  dissatisfied  as  long  as 
there  are  any  unexplored  remainders  of  knowl- 
edge. When  the  challenge  of  the  unknown  is 
once  heard,  there  is  a  restlessness  which  is  im- 
patient of  ignorance,  a  natural  impulse  to  seek 
the  reason  of  things,  an  instinctive  curiosity 
which  is  not  content  merely  to  see,  but  which 
must  also  understand,  and  which  is  a  perpetual 
spur  to  perseverance  through  all  the  exactions 
of  laborious  research.  Whenever  there  is  this 
inner  constraint,  there  is  a  largess  of  spirit 
which  has  no  thought  of  placing  a  patent  upon 
the  output  of  its  brain.  The  glow  of  discovery 
is  a  sufficient  reward,  to  which  nothing  can  be 
added  save  the  satisfaction  that  others  share  it. 
It  has  been  urged,  however,  that  the  natural 
origin  of  knowledge  is  to  be  traced  to  the  effort 
which  is  put  forth  in  order  to  satisfy  some  felt 
need.  With  the  conscious  and  pressing  neces- 
sities of  hunting  and  fishing,  of  warfare,  of 
cooking,  of  domicile  and  of  raiment,  man  was 
quick  to  invent  the  first  crude  tools  and  weap- 
ons,— a  covering  for  his  body,  a  roof  over  his 


40        THE  PARADOX  OF  RESEARCH 

head,  also  utensils  in  which  he  might  prepare 
his  food  and  which  would  prove  indestructible 
when  exposed  to  fire.     Later,  the  pursuits  of 
agriculture  and  the  early  beginnings  of  the  arts 
of  commerce    and    manufacture   gave   rise   to 
implements  and  machines  representing  an  in- 
finite variety  of  inventive  skill.     It  is,  however, 
a  primitive  age  wherein  knowledge  arises  solely 
In  response  to  the  demand  of  utility.     Truly, 
a  higher  stage  of  civilization  is  reached  where 
there  exists   a  class,  however  small,  which  is 
able  to  devote  its  time  and  energies  to  the  pur- 
suit of  truth  for  its  own  sake.     Such  a  body  of 
men  has  been  styled  the  "leisure  class."     It  is 
a  leisure  not  merely  from  manual  labor  and 
commercial    pursuits,    but    it    is    above    every 
other    thing   a   leisure    from    the    servitude   of 
utility.    Such  was  the  class  of  philosophers  and 
mathematicians  in  the  early  history  of  Greece. 
Such  is  the  scholarly  class  in  every  age,  provided 
the  appellation  of  "scholarly"  is  justly  merited. 
The  scholar,  in  his  devotion  to  his  subject,  in 
his  consecration  to  the  high  vocation  which  he 
follows,  must  be  one  who  is  emancipated  from 
the  domination  of  the  utility  idea.     Then  only 


THE  PARADOX  OF  RESEARCH        41 

is  he  a  free  man  in  the  kingdom  of  knowledge. 
Bacon  has  said  that  the  end  of  all  scientiHc 
investigation  is  "the  gathering  of  fruit" — that 
is,  the  turning  of  all  discovery  to  some  practical 
account.  The  true  produce  of  the  scholar's 
brain,  however,  is  of  the  nature  of  seed  rather 
than  of  fruit,  and  that  of  incalculable  variety 
and  possibihty.  The  utilitarian  strain  which 
was  the  blemish  of  Bacon's  character  was  like- 
wise the  defect  of  his  scientific  method. 

Although  the  investigator  may  not  have 
sought  that  which  is  useful,  yet  his  discoveries 
often  admit  of  a  direct  practical  application  to 
the  e very-day  needs  and  comforts  of  life;  and 
so  the  practical  value,  which,  throughout  the 
whole  course  of  his  investigations  was  never 
sought  and  never  dreamed  of,  may  become 
realized,  nevertheless,  in  full  measure.  The 
secret  of  nature  once  discovered  becomes  the 
ground  of  a  new  form  of  reasoning;  new  minds 
busy  themselves  with  the  practical  problems 
which  may  be  suggested  by  it.  Thus  in  the 
wake  of  the  discoverers  in  pure  science  follow 
the  inventors.  The  men  who  were  the  pioneers 
in  the  field  of  electricity  and  magnetism  labored 


42        THE  PARADOX  OF  RESEARCH 

with  a  keen  interest  born  of  a  constraining  love 
of  nature,  and  with  no  thought  of  gain  save  in 
the  discovery  of  that  knowledge  which  is  its 
own  reward.  And  yet  the  work  of  such  minds 
as  Oersted,  Ampere,  Faraday,  and  Henry  opened 
the  way  to  the  electric  telegraph  and  the  innumer- 
able applications  of  their  electro-magnetic  dis- 
coveries, to  the  benefit  of  the  race  and  the 
progress  of  civilization.  Also,  in  our  own  day, 
the  investigations  of  Hertz  in  Germany  and  of 
Thomson  in  England,  incited  and  sustained  by 
an  interest  purely  scientific,  have  made  the  sys- 
tem of  the  wireless  telegraphy  possible. 

The  discoveries  of  the  rays  of  Lenard,  of 
Becquerel,  and  of  Rontgen  were  the  result  of 
research  which  was  conducted  in  a  like  spirit; 
moreover,  they  have  led  to  practical  applica- 
tions in  the  field  of  therapeutics  and  surgery 
which  are  of  inestimable  service;  nor  is  the  pos- 
sibility of  their  further  utility  by  any  means  ex- 
hausted. The  practical  value  of  a  truth  is  often 
a  kind  of  by-product  which  direct  research  does 
not  reveal.  The  great  science  of  modern  chem- 
istry has  been  built  upon  the  foundations  which 
were    laid    by   the   genius   of   Lavoisier,    who 


THE  PARADOX  OF  RESEARCH        43 

brought  to  his  labors  a  spirit  fired  by  a  love  of 
nature  for  her  own  sake.  However,  the  prac- 
tical output  of  those  labors  has  modified  essen- 
tially every  phase  of  our  modern  industrial, 
domestic,  and  commercial  life. 

The  application  of  chemical  truth  to  the 
problems  of  agriculture  and  physiology,  through 
the  brilliant  work  of  Liebig,  was  possible  only 
because  of  the  toil  of  the  many  whose  eyes  were 
never  upon  the  goal  either  of  general  utility  or 
personal  reward.  In  a  quaint  old  writing  of 
one  of  the  pioneers  in  chemistry,  Beccher,  called 
the  "Physica  Subterranea,'*  the  author  speaks 
of  chemists  as  a  "strange  class  of  mortals,  im- 
pelled by  an  almost  insane  impulse  to  seek  their 
pleasure  among  smoke  and  vapor,  soot  and 
flame,  poisons  and  poverty."  "My  kingdom," 
said  he,  "is  not,  however,  of  this  world.  I 
trust  that  I  have  got  hold  of  my  pitcher  by  the 
right  handle,  the  true  method  of  treating  this 
study;  for  the  Pseudo-chy mists  seek  gold,  but 
the  true  philosophers,  science,  which  is  more 
precious  than  gold."  Such  men  may  be  nobly 
doomed  to  lives  of  unrequited  sacrifice;  but 
they  leave  to  their  fellows  what  they  themselves 


44        THE  PARADOX  OF  RESEARCH 

never  possessed, — the  means  of  increased  wealth, 
health,  comfort,  and  power. 

If  utility  were  the  sole  incentive  to  research, 
that  most  admirable  of  all  graces,  the  patience 
of  hope,  would  often  fail;  for  the  practical 
value  of  knowledge  is  slow  of  revelation. 
Knowledge,  to  be  practically  available,  requires 
in  many  cases  to  undergo  an  aging  process. 
The  new  wine  of  truth  also  needs  the  touch  of 
time.  The  most  beneficent  ends  are  often  so 
remote  that  they  can  be  disclosed  only  after  a 
long  series  of  discoveries,  which  lead  up  to 
them  by  a  natural  sequence,  but  which  afford 
in  the  process  of  their  unfolding  no  intimation 
whatsoever  of  their  ultimate  utility.  When  the 
utility  is  not  obvious  in  the  first  stages  of  an 
investigation  there  is  need  of  a  deeper  incentive, 
so  that  research  may  not  be  abandoned  in  a 
moment  of  discouragement.  And  discourage- 
ment will  come  very  soon  if  no  evidence  of 
practical  results  is  forthcoming. 

It  is  to  be  observed,  also,  that  the  utility  of 
any  portion  of  knowledge  depends,  in  many 
instances,  upon  its  combination  with  other  por- 
tions.    Alone,  it  is  barren.     It  has  no  utility  in 


TPTE  PARADOX  OF  RESEARCH        45 

itself.  But  it  may  contribute  certain  elements 
which,  in  collocation  with  others,  make  for  util- 
ity of  singular  value.  Darwin,  in  the  line  of  his 
own  investigations,  has  drawn  attention  to  the 
fact  that  utility  in  most  cases  depends  upon  the 
co-ordination  of  various  elements  which  are 
separately  useless.  It  frequently  happens  in 
other  fields  also  that  the  labors  of  many  minds 
must  be  brought  together  in  order  to  produce 
practical  results  of  any  real  significance  and 
value.  The  solitary  toilers  may  not  be  able  to 
discern  any  promise  of  utility  in  their  separate 
labors.  Their  particular  contribution  is  only  a 
fraction,  after  all;  and  yet,  nevertheless,  it  may 
prove  to  be  an  essential  part  of  a  combined 
whole  whose  resultant  effects  may  possess  prac- 
tical value  of  a  high  order.  The  efficiency  of 
the  methods  of  physical  science  and  ultimately 
the  application  of  its  results  to  practical  affairs 
have  been  increased  incalculably  through  the 
brilliant  speculations  in  pure  mathematics  of 
men  who  knew  not  the  language  of  utility. 
Others,  however,  are  able  to  combine  their  re- 
sults in  such  a  manner  as  to  give  a  practical  turn 
to  considerations  primarily  theoretical. 


46        THE  PARADOX  OF  RESEARCH 

The  inventor  stands  at  that  point  of  advantage 
where  many  lines  of  discovery  converge.  The 
several  independent  results  he  is  able  to  unite 
and  embody  in  a  new  machine,  a  new  method, 
or  a  new  process.  Many  inventions  appear  as 
the  outcome  of  collaboration;  the  co-workers 
are  not  always  contemporary;  the  lapse  of 
time  alone  may  serve  to  efface  their  memory. 
Seldom  known  and  less  often  appreciated,  they 
nevertheless  through  their  patient  efforts  con- 
tribute those  essential  elements  of  knowledge 
without  which  the  inventor's  skill  would  surely 
fail  of  success.  We  are  accustomed  to  think 
of  the  inventor  as  commanding  the  forces  of 
nature  to  do  his  bidding.  He,  however,  is  not 
dealing  directly  with  the  forces  of  nature,  but 
rather  with  the  ideas  which  other  men  have 
formed  of  these  forces,  which  they  have  so  in- 
terpreted that  they  can  be  made  plain  and  be  put 
into  words  and  reduced  to  the  expressions  of  law 
and  formula.  The  inventor  is  not  merely  engaged 
in  the  task  of  fitting  part  to  part  of  a  machine; 
he  builds  with  rarer  material.  He  is  building  an 
idea  which  is  a  composite.  The  elements  which 
enter  into  its  texture  are  the  thoughts  of  men. 


THE  PARADOX  OF  RESEARCH        47 

It  is  to  be  noticed  also  that  a  mind  exclusively 
bent  upon  the  idea  of  utility  necessarily  narrows 
the  range  of  the  imagination.  For  it  is  the 
imagination  which  pictures  to  the  inner  eye  of 
the  investigator  the  indefinitely  extending  sphere 
of  the  possible, — that  region  of  hypothesis  and 
explanation,  of  underlying  cause  and  controlling 
law.  The  area  of  suggestion  and  experiment  is 
thus  pushed  beyond  the  actual  field  of  vision. 
But,  if  utility  is  the  sole  end  of  research,  the 
scope  of  imaginative  inquiry  is  thereby  nar- 
rowed. There  is  no  comprehensive  sweep  of 
the  thought,  no  power  of  divination,  no  com- 
pelling fancy.  Whatever  fails  to  show  a  face 
value  of  utility  does  not  arrest  and  hold  the 
attention.  Significant  facts  and  relations  are 
overlooked.  The  by-ways  of  knowledge  are  left 
unexplored  in  the  hot  pursuit  of  the  immedi- 
ately useful.  But  where  there  is  absorbed  and 
sustained  interest  in  an  object  of  research  for 
its  own  sake,  the  imagination  broods  over  its 
tasks  with  a  delight  and  passion  which  tend  to 
provoke  the  hidden  truth. 

In  the  prevailing  tendency  in  certain  quarters 
to    direct   research    accordins:    to    the    lead    of 

o 


48        THE  PARADOX  OF  RESEARCH 

utility,  there  is  a  vicious  theory  of  education 
which  is  being  urged  to-day  with  all  the  en- 
thusiasm of  a  new  gospel:    "Teach  the  child 
that  all  knowledge  can  be  disposed  to  some 
useful  end.     Cultivate  early  the  habit  of  look- 
ing for  the  practical  worth  of  everything  that 
he   learns,   and  let  the   student  of  later  years 
bear    constantly    in    mind    that    knowledge    is 
power.'*     Such  is  the  doctrine  of  a  bread-and- 
butter  theory  of  pedagogy.     But  why  push  the 
child  out  into  the  current  which  tends  to  draw 
every  one  into  its  precipitate  flow  ?     In  this  age 
of  materialistic  drift,  the  idea  of  practical  values 
and  utility  considerations  need  not  be  taught, 
nor  even  mentioned.     The  fact  is,  it  cannot  be 
escaped;    its   influence   is   all-pervading,  inevi- 
table.    While  it  is  undoubtedly  true  that  the 
student  should  be  interested  in  the  subject  which 
he  is  pursuing,  let  us  not,  however,  confuse  as 
some  have  done  the  two  radically  distinct  ideas, 
of  an  interest  in  a  subject  for  its  own  sake,  and 
an  interest  in  the  practical  utility  which  it  may 
possess.     It  is  possible,  and  indeed  absolutely 
essential    in    my    opinion,    that   the    student's 
interest   should  be  stimulated    directly  by  the 


THE  PARADOX  OF  RESEARCH        49 

rich  material  which  certain  subjects  present; 
and  so  the  thought  be  withdrawn,  to  some  ex- 
tent at  least,  from  the  exclusive  consideration 
of  present  or  future  apphcation  of  the  knowl- 
edge which  he  seeks  to  the  practical  affairs 
of  life. 

It  is  true  that  knowledge  is  power;  but  this 
should  not  be  held  out  continually  to  the  student 
as  an  alluring  bait.  Knowledge  can  compel 
homage  and  devotion  without  stooping  to  offer 
a  bribe,  or  to  cry  her  wares  in  the  street.  There 
are,  moreover,  certain  indirect  uses  of  knowledge 
which  can  never  be  consciously  in  the  thought 
of  student  or  teacher  during  the  actual  process 
of  instruction.  They  are  too  subtle,  too  far- 
reaching  in  their  effects,  too  complex,  too  cu- 
mulative for  any  one  to  define  and  name,  and  put 
into  the  form  of  a  maxim  or  rule.  They  can- 
not be  specified  and  pointed  to  as  the  obvious 
rewards  of  industry  in  the  pursuit  of  truth. 
They  constitute  not  so  much  the  results  which 
knowledge  can  attain  as  the  atmosphere  which 
knowledge  permanently  creates — the  finer  flavor 
of  thought,  the  sound  reason,  the  true  judg- 
ment, and  the  sane  appreciation,  which  are  the 


50        THE  PARADOX  OF  RESEARCH 

marks  of  a  richly  stored  and  accurately  trained 
mind.  He  who  lacks  in  these  particulars  fails 
to  realize  the  full  measure  of  his  possibilities. 
And  yet  it  often  happens,  strangely  enough, 
that  this  added  power  in  a  man's  life  is  missed 
simply  on  account  of  his  restricted  inter- 
ests, and  his  impatient  haste  to  acquire  only 
that  kind  of  knowledge  which  may  seem  to 
him  at  the  time  to  be  of  some  obvious  use 
and  advantage  in  the  efficient  direction  of  his 
energies. 

This,  then,  is  the  paradox  of  knowledge  that 
he  who  regards  knowledge  as  his  servant  is 
never  completely  master  of  it;  but  whoever  re- 
gards himself  as  the  servant  of  knowledge,  he 
alone  is  master  in  the  world  of  thought.  There 
can  be  no  higher  standard  of  intellectual  attain- 
ment, or  a  more  alluring  reward  of  research 
than  that  which  is  expressed  by  the  old  Greek 
author,  Isocrates,  in  his  appreciation  of  Athens 
and  the  part  which  she  has  played  in  the  his- 
tory of  thought:  "So  far  hath  our  city  passed 
beyond  the  rest  of  men,  both  in  thought  and 
speech,  that  her  disciples  are  become  their  teach- 
ers; and  she  hath  made  the  name  of  the  Greeks 


THE  PARADOX  OF  RESEARCH    51 

seem  no  longer  to  be  the  name  of  a  race,  but 
of  knowledge.  They  rather  are  to  be  called 
Greeks  who  share  our  training  than  they  who 
share  our  descent." 


IV 
ON  RESPONSIBILITY 

^T^HERE  is  much  loose  and  confused  thinking 
about  the  nature  of  responsibility.  Not 
only  are  there  innumerable  instances  of  persons 
holding  positions  of  trust  who  are  evading  evi- 
dent responsibilities,  but  also  more  particularly, 
of  those  who  would  seek  to  justify  themselves  in 
such  a  course.  The  latter  are  like  the  figures  in 
Nast's  famous  cartoon  of  the  Tweed  Ring,  who 
are  all  standing  in  a  circle,  and  each  one  point- 
ing aside  with  his  thumb  to  his  neighbor  as  the 
responsible  person.  It  is  the  old  story  of  the 
other  man.  There  are  many  circumstances  in 
life  where  it  is  convenient  to  shift  the  respon- 
sibility upon  some  one  else;  and  whenever  one 
sets  himself  to  defend  a  convenient  course  of 
action,  he  does  not  always  see  straight  and  think 
clear.  Even  though  he  may  succeed  in  con- 
vincing himself,  nevertheless  if  in  this  process 
there  is  any  element  of  self-deception,  he  is 
perilously  near  the  danger  line. 

52 


ON  RESPONSIBILITY  53 

There  are  no  fallacies  so  subtle  as  those 
which  insinuate  themselves  into  our  reasoning 
at  a  time  when  our  interests  are  involved.  To 
play  the  role  of  judge  and  of  special  pleader  at 
one  and  the  same  time  is  an  impossible  task. 
Therefore  when  we  seek  to  free  ourselves  from 
the  burden  of  responsibility  in  any  situation,  we 
must  be  peculiarly  on  guard,  that  we  do  not 
allow  ourselves  to  become  ensnared  in  the  toils 
of  those  artificial  distinctions  and  plausible  ex- 
planations which  when  stripped  of  their  verbal 
dress  appear  in  their  nakedness  as  contemptible 
subterfuges. 

One  of  these  convenient  ideas  which  serve  as 
a  kind  of  natural  anaesthetic  to  conscience  is  the 
belief  that  any  responsibility  which  is  divided  is 
thereby  lessened.  Responsibility,  however,  can 
never  be  dissipated  by  diffusion.  The  director 
of  a  corporation  may  content  himself  with  the 
comforting  thought  that  where  many  are  jointly 
responsible,  his  share  of  the  common  obligation 
after  all  cannot  be  regarded  as  very  serious. 
And  in  this  idea  there  lies  a  very  fundamental 
error.  For  responsibility  is  by  its  nature  some- 
thing intensive  and  not  extensive.     It  can  be 


54  ON  RESPONSIBILITY 

divided  among  many,  but  it  is  not  thereby  di- 
minished in  degree.  When  by  the  ordinary  proc- 
esses of  arithmetical  division,  however,  one 
number  is  divided  by  another,  the  result  is  only 
a  small  part  of  the  original  amount.  It  is  al- 
ways a  lessening  process.  But  the  idea  of  re- 
sponsibility cannot  be  expressed  in  any  such 
quantitative  terms.  Dividends  can  be  divided 
into  separate  parts,  but  not  responsibility.  Re- 
sponsibility can  never  be  conceived  in  the  light 
of  a  magnitude.  It  belongs  to  the  class  of  things 
which,  when  divided,  each  part  is  equal  to  the 
whole. 

Responsibility  in  this  respect  is  like  pleasure 
which,  when  shared,  is  not  lessened,  but  the 
rather  increased,  as  Bacon  long  ago  pointed  out. 
The  same  quality,  also,  we  find  in  the  rewards  of 
honor,  or  of  fame  it  may  be,  which  come  to  the 
many  who  have  served  in  a  common  cause  and 
rejoice  in  a  common  victory.  Thus  the  glory  of 
the  whole  is  each  one's  share.  It  can  be  divided 
among  many  without  loss.  So,  also,  the  appre- 
ciation of  beauty  in  nature  or  in  art  shows  no 
diminishing  returns,  although  the  number  who 
experience  the  joy  of  it  may  be  increased  with- 


ON  RESPONSIBILITY  55 

out  limit.  This,  also,  is  the  characteristic  feature 
of  responsibiHty.  Parents  share  the  respon- 
sibihty  of  their  children,  but  the  complete  re- 
sponsibiHty and  no  half  measure  of  it  rests  upon 
each.  The  director  of  a  bank  or  an  insurance 
company  shares  the  responsibility  of  his  position 
with  his  colleagues  on  the  same  board;  but  the 
shared  responsibility  is  not  a  per  capitum  por- 
tion, but  the  whole. 

This  is  not  a  new  doctrine;  it  comes  to  us 
with  an  immemorial  sanction.  But  it  seems 
to  have  been  forgotten  in  recent  years.  "My 
share  of  the  responsibility  is  but  slight,"  is  a 
common  phrase  which  may  be  heard  on  all 
sides  at  the  present  day.  If  one  would  thus 
seek  to  minimize  his  sense  of  obligation  as  re- 
gards that  which  may  be  placed  in  his  keeping 
as  a  trust,  he  should  not  forget  that  his  share 
of  responsibility  is  not  a  part,  but  the  whole, 
undiminished  and  untransferable.  He  may 
have  others  associated  with  him,  it  is  true,  but 
his  individual  responsibility  cannot  be  shifted 
upon  them.  He  must  meet  it  in  the  full  rigor 
of  its  demands,  and  regard  himself  as  though 
alone  in  the  discharge  of  his  duties. 


56  ON  RESPONSIBILITY 

There  is  also  the  fallacy  of  the  delegated 
responsibility.  It  is  impossible  for  one  at  the 
head  of  large  business  interests,  for  instance, 
to  give  his  personal  attention  to  every  minute 
detail.  He  finds  himself  naturally  compelled 
to  delegate  much  of  the  work  of  supervision 
and  of  administration  to  others  who  act  in  the 
capacity  of  his  deputies.  Otherwise  the  busi- 
ness of  Hfe  would  be  impossible.  This  is  in- 
deed a  commonplace  of  every-day  business 
routine.  But  because  some  one  else  may  as- 
sume the  responsibility,  he  who  deputizes  it  is 
not  wholly  relieved  of  it.  He  passes  on  the 
duty  of  actually  performing  some  specific  work, 
and  yet  the  obligation  still  rests  with  him  not 
to  do  the  task,  it  is  true,  but  at  least  to  see  that 
it  is  done.  We  cannot  afford  to  ignore  the 
common-law  judgment  hat  the  act  of  the  agent 
is  the  act  of  the  principal.  We  cannot  take  it 
for  granted  that  the  mere  transfer  of  respon- 
sibility to  another  assures  a  satisfactory  dis- 
charge of  all  the  duties  which  it  involves.  We 
do  not  dare  to  shut  our  eyes  to  the  fact  as  to 
whether  such  duties  are  fulfilled  or  not,  on  the 
ground  that  the  responsibility  now  rests  upon 


ON  RESPONSIBILITY  57 

another  and  not  upon  ourselves.  It  is  his 
responsibiHty,  but  it  is  also  ours.  A  person 
who  is  at  the  head  of  a  large  business  enterprise 
cannot  be  omnipresent  or  omniscient;  but  he 
is  responsible  for  the  kind  of  men  who  are  his 
partners  in  responsibiHty,  and  also  for  the 
atmosphere  which  pervades  his  business,  for 
the  general  morale  of  the  service,  for  the  dis- 
cipline that  is  enforced,  for  the  prevailing 
policy  and  method  pursued,  and  for  the  spirit 
and  tone  which  characterize  all  departments, 
however  various  they  may  be.  Division  of 
labor  is  not  a  dissipation  of  responsibility.  He 
who  is  responsible  for  a  particular  task  is  re- 
lieved of  that  responsibility  only  when  there  is 
evidence  that  the  given  work  has  been  done. 
The  head  of  a  corporation  should  devise  cer- 
tain methods  by  which  such  evidence  can  be 
regularly  forthcoming,  so  that  when  any  cog  in 
any  wheel  may  chance  to  slip,  the  fact  may  be 
at  once  apparent  at  the  central  seat  of  respon- 
sibility. 

There  is,  of  course,  such  a  thing  as  a  serial 
responsibility,  as  I  would  style  it,  that  is,  where 
a  number   of  persons  in  turn   assume  the  re- 


58  ON  RESPONSIBILITY 

sponsibility  for  a  certain  task,  each  contributing 
his  share  to  its  accomplishment,  and  then  pass 
on  the  full  responsibility  to  some  other.  This 
is  illustrated  in  the  sending  of  a  registered 
package.  Each  one  in  the  series  does  his  part 
in  the  process  of  forwarding  it,  and  receives  a 
signed  acknowledgment  that  another  has  re- 
lieved him  of  his  particular  duty  and  of  all 
responsibility  connected  with  it.  The  ordinary 
business  of  life,  however,  cannot  always  be  so 
nicely  adjusted.  Responsibility  appears  more 
often  in  an  indefinite  and  diffused  form,  in 
which  many  persons  are  involved,  and  no  one 
at  any  time  carries  the  full  burden  alone. 
There  is  no  way  of  escaping  responsibility  of 
this  kind  as  long  as  we  remain  within  the  area 
of  its  pervading  power.  We  dare  not  hang 
about  the  outer  edge  of  this  region,  hoping  to 
reap  the  possible  rewards,  and  yet  think  to 
evade  all  blame  or  loss  in  the  event  of  untoward 
results.  There  are  many  who  thus  endeavor 
to  hold  their  course  along  some  such  imaginary 
line,  so  that  they  may  shrewdly  keep  within  it 
to  share  the  honor  or  dividends  which  may 
accrue,  and  yet  be  able  to  swerve  to  the  outer 


ON  RESPONSIBILITY  59 

side  of  it  whenever  the  area  within  may  become 
the  storm-centre  of  indignant  protest  and  re- 
crimination. 

Again  it  is  often  urged  that  we  are  in  a 
measure  relieved  of  the  responsibility  of  an  act, 
when  such  an  act  is  a  customary  procedure  in 
the  business,  professional,  or  social  circles  in 
which  we  may  happen  to  move.  "  Everybody 
does  it,'*  it  is  said,  "it  is  the  usual  practice; 
then  why  should  I  be  overscrupulous  concerning 
that  which  general  usage  has  sanctioned  as  per- 
missible ? "  Such  is  the  argument.  And  yet 
responsibility  at  the  last  analysis  must  be  rec- 
ognized as  an  individual  matter.  No  man's 
responsibility  can  be  judged  in  the  light  of 
another's.  Custom  does  not  make  right.  The 
low  level  which  the  morale  of  a  guild  or  of  a 
profession  sometimes  reaches  is  due  to  this  very 
fact,  that  no  individual  sees  his  peculiar  re- 
sponsibility in  such  a  light  that  he  is  willing  to 
break  the  bond  of  custom  by  protest  or  by 
practice.  It  is  not  easy  to  be  independent 
under  such  circumstances,  but  that  does  not 
make  it  any  the  less  imperative.  Responsi- 
bility is  not  lessened   merely  because  it  may 


6o  ON  RESPONSIBILITY 

entail  extraordinary  courage  and  sacrifice.  We 
do  not  justify  ourselves  in  the  failure  to  meet 
evident  obligations  by  the  plea  that  circum- 
stances and  conditions  are  too  much  for  us  to 
cope  with.  The  convenient,  the  comfortable, 
and  the  easy-going  are  not  the  symptoms  which 
usually  form  the  diagnosis  of  responsibility. 

There  is  another  fallacy  which  many  fall  into 
of  securing  freedom  from  responsibility  by  the 
assumption  of  a  convenient  ignorance.  A  can- 
didate, for  instance,  may  not  choose  to  know 
the  detail  of  method  and  of  policy  pursued  by  a 
campaign  committee  in  charge  of  his  interests. 
The  members  of  the  committee  in  turn  deem  it 
wise  to  have  him  kept  in  ignorance.  It  is  gen- 
erally understood  that  whatever  happens,  he 
is  to  know  nothing  about  it.  The  comforting 
theory  is  that  no  responsibility  can  attach  to  a 
person  concerning  an  act  of  which  he  is  igno- 
rant. This  is  doubtless  true,  provided  he  is  not 
purposely  ignorant.  A  person  may  not  be  held 
responsible  for  failure  to  see  some  obvious  cir- 
cumstance when  his  eyes  are  shut;  but  he  is 
responsible  for  his  eyes  being  shut  when  they 
ought  to  be  open. 


ON  RESPONSIBILITY  6i 

There  are  men  who  know  that  certain  results 
cannot  possibly  be  accompHshed  without  cer- 
tain definite  means  being  used,  and  yet  con- 
sent weakly  to  profit  by  these  results  on  the 
ground  that  they  do  not  know  explicitly  the 
character  of  the  means  used  to  attain  them.  It 
is  a  lame  excuse.  We  are  responsible  not  only 
for  that  which  we  see  and  hear,  but  also  for 
that  which  may  be  implied  in  the  things  seen 
and  heard,  and  which  we  are  compelled  to 
recognize  as  the  necessary  consequence  of  them. 
It  is  not  merely  the  actual  situation  in  which  we 
find  ourselves,  but  also  the  logic  of  such  situa- 
tions that  must  be  interpreted  and  judged  by  us 
as  to  the  measure  of  our  responsibility  for  them. 
It  must  be  remembered  that  the  very  ground  of 
our  responsibility  is  the  presupposition  that  we 
are  in  complete  possession  of  our  reason.  How 
absurd  therefore  to  narrow  the  range  of  respon- 
sibility by  excluding  the  obvious  inferences 
which  the  reason  of  any  man  of  ordinary  intel- 
ligence must  surely  recognize.  If  a  campaign 
committee,  for  instance,  expends  large  sums  of 
money,  it  stands  to  reason  that  the  one  in  whose 
interests  it  has  been   raised   must  know  that 


62  ON  RESPONSIBILITY 

revenues  are  not  created  by  magic.  Merely  to 
choose  not  to  know  is  to  ignore  a  definite  re- 
sponsibility and  thereby  assume  an  indefinite 
one.  It  is  like  signing  a  blank  check  to  an 
unknown  order  and  for  an  unknown  amount. 
The  man  who  would  rather  not  know  what  his 
friends  are  doing  in  his  behalf  should  be  held 
to  strict  account  for  his  voluntary  ignorance. 
No  one  can  afford  to  have  things  done  for  him 
which  he  would  scorn  to  do  or  be  afraid  to  do 
himself. 

There  is  also  a  very  common  feeling  that  any 
one  may  repudiate  all  responsibility  in  a  given 
situation,  if  he  will  only  declare  forcibly  and 
loudly  enough  that  he  does  not  regard  himself 
as  in  the  least  responsible  for  the  same.  He 
may  insist  that  he  will  wash  his  hands  of  the 
whole  matter;  but  there  are  certain  stains  that 
cannot  be  thus  removed.  The  hands  may  be 
washed;  but  they  may  not  be  made  clean  by 
the  process.  There  is  a  ceremonial  purity 
which  does  not  penetrate  beneath  the  surface. 
How  often  men  justify  themselves,  when 
feebly  yielding  to  the  prevailing  opinion  of  the 
many  associated  with  them  in  some  position  of 


ON  RESPONSIBILITY  63 

trust,  by  the  ready  excuse  that  after  all  the 
majority  must  rule.  It  is  true  that  the  major- 
ity must  rule;  but  it  is  equally  true  that  the  mi- 
nority often  must  fight.  A  mere  verbal  protest 
followed  by  a  quiet  acquiescence  is  not  sufficient 
when  honor  or  honesty  is  the  issue.  An  un- 
compromising attitude  of  opposition  may  have 
to  be  maintained  until  the  court  of  last  appeal 
is  reached;  that  court  may  be  a  board  of  di- 
rectors, or  the  stockholders,  or  public  opinion, 
or  in  the  regular  course  of  legal  procedure  even 
the  Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States  itself. 
Responsibility  often  demands  a  fight  to  the  fin- 
ish.    In  that  case,  compromise  is  cowardly. 

We  are  responsible  for  our  silence,  for  our 
inertia,  for  our  ignorance,  for  our  indifference — ■ 
in  short,  for  all  those  negative  qualities  which 
commonly  constitute  the  "dummy"  directors — 
those  inconsequent  personages  who  would  enjoy 
the  honor  and  the  perquisites  of  their  office  with- 
out allowing  themselves  to  be  unduly  burdened 
with  its  duties  and  cares.  The  president  of  a 
corporation  or  a  superintendent  does  not  assume 
the  responsibility  vested  in  its  board  of  directors; 
he  merely  represents  that  responsibility.     And 


64  ON  RESPONSIBILITY 

when  they  would  implicitly  assign  all  sense  of 
their  personal  obligations  to  his  keeping,  they 
not  only  put  themselves  in  a  position  to  be  easily 
fooled,  but  actually  offer  a  ready  temptation  to 
him  to  fool  them.  They  are  thus  doubly  rep- 
rehensible; for  the  neglect  of  duty  on  the  one 
hand,  and  on  the  other  for  extending  a  virtual 
invitation  for  some  one  to  use  them  as  tools  for 
unlawful  ends.  Not  only  the  wreck  of  a  busi- 
ness, but  the  wreck  of  a  human  being  must  be 
laid  at  their  door,  who  by  a  splendid  capacity 
for  negligence  do  thus  expose  another  to  the 
play  of  the  most  subtle  temptations  which  can 
be  conceived. 

There  is  also  the  mistaken  notion  that  we 
may  escape  certain  responsibilities  simply  by  not 
assuming  them.  There  are  some  obligations, 
however,  which  we  do  not  dare  to  refuse,  and 
which  indeed  it  is  not  possible  to  refuse.  We 
have  no  choice  in  the  matter.  We  cannot  say 
In  truth  that  we  have  no  responsibility,  for  in- 
stance, for  the  general  decency  and  good  order 
of  the  community  in  which  we  live  merely  be- 
cause we  have  chosen  to  keep  out  of  the  village 
politics,  and  therefore,  not  being  on  the  bor- 


ON  RESPONSIBILITY  65 

ough  council  or  the  board  of  health,  it  is  none 
of  our  business  if  the  laws  of  nature,  of  man,  or 
of  God  are  violated.  It  must  be  remembered 
that  responsibilities  of  such  a  kind  are  not 
assumed  by  definite  choice,  but  belong  to  us 
whether  we  will  or  not.  Certain  responsibili- 
ties we  do  not  choose;  they  choose  us.  If  at 
times  they  seem  to  us  vague  and  indefinite,  it 
becomes  our  duty  to  make  them  definite  through 
some  effort  on  our  part.  We  are  held  to  ac- 
count not  merely  for  doing  the  obvious  duty 
that  circumstance  may  urge  upon  us,  but  also 
for  creating  the  circumstance  which  may  give 
rise  to  a  wholly  new  set  of  duties.  We  are  not 
only  responsible  for  lending  our  service  to  the 
cause  which  has  a  rightful  claim  upon  us,  but 
also  we  may  be  responsible  for  the  establishment 
of  a  cause  to  serve.  We  are  responsible  for 
the  very  fact,  if  indeed  it  be  a  fact,  that  our  re- 
sponsibilities in  life  are  so  few  and  so  slight. 
If  we  choose  to  carry  the  lighter  burden,  it  is 
not  a  matter  of  felicitation,  but  one  for  our  most 
serious  personal  concern;  for  an  irresponsible 
person  is  always  defective  in  some  respect,  either 
in  body,  mind  or  character. 


66  ON  RESPONSIBILITY 

There  are  those  moreover  who  imagine  that 
in  certain  relations  of  Hfe  there  can  be  devised 
some  natural  substitute  for  the  sense  of  respon- 
sibihty.  It  is  possible,  of  course,  to  estabhsh  a 
set  of  automatic  checks  upon  an  employee's 
activities  of  such  a  nature  as  to  reduce  his  per- 
sonal responsibility  to  a  minimum.  Any  fail- 
ure in  the  performance  of  his  duties  is  at  once 
mechanically  discovered  by  the  various  systems 
of  time-clocks,  bell-punches,  cash  registers,  and 
the  like.  This  is  very  well  in  all  cases  where 
the  labor  is  that  of  simple  routine.  Mechanical 
activity  can  be  checked  by  a  mechanical  device. 
Not  so,  however,  as  regards  those  duties  which 
demand  a  higher  order  of  capacity — such  as 
that  of  sound  judgment,  a  fine  sense  of  dis- 
crimination, and  the  power  of  resourceful  initia- 
tive. In  all  such  matters  there  can  be  no  sub- 
stitute for  the  responsible  personality.  Man 
is  a  responsible  being  because  of  this  very  ele- 
ment of  free  activity  in  his  nature  which  no 
mechanical  contrivance,  however  ingenious,  can 
ever  gauge.  We  are  all  so  completely  depend- 
ent upon  the  integrity,  fidelity,  and  efficiency  of 
our  fellow-men  in  the  more  complex  relations  of 


ON   RESPONSIBILITY  67 

life  that  we  must  at  times,  and  often  the  most 
critical,  trust  them  implicitly.  We  do  not  pro- 
ceed far  in  any  undertaking  without  being 
aware  that  we  are  holding  another  responsible, 
or  that  some  one  is  holding  us  responsible  for 
those  inevitable  duties  which  arise  out  of  the 
relations  of  man  to  man  the  world  over.  If  a 
man  would  escape  all  responsibility  he  must 
place  himself  wholly  outside  of  the  relations  of 
life,  for  life  is  responsibility.  As  we  have  seen, 
responsibility  remains  with  us  even  though  we 
may  ask  others  to  assume  it;  we  share  it  with 
others,  but  our  portion  is  the  same;  when  we 
turn  our  backs  upon  it,  we  find  it  still  facing  us; 
we  flee  from  it,  and  however  far  it  may  be,  we 
behold  it  waiting  for  us  at  the  journey's  end. 


V 

THE   WHOLE   AND   THE   PART 

^T^HERE  is  a  common  fallacy  which  is  due 
to  a  misapprehension  of  that  familiar 
axiom,  "the  whole  equals  the  sum  of  its  parts." 
We  imagine  that  this  is  true  in  every  sphere 
of  experience,  but  it  is  not.  If  our  thought  is 
concerned  with  magnitude,  lines,  or  surfaces, 
and  if  it  is  a  matter  of  indifference  as  to  the 
order  in  which  one  relates  the  separate  parts, 
then  the  simple  axiom  holds;  but  otherwise 
we  run  into  all  kinds  of  error  and  absurdities. 
A  watch  ceases  to  be  a  watch  when  you  have 
merely  the  separate  parts  before  you.  The 
sum  of  them  will  not  mark  the  minutes  and 
hours.  The  collection  of  parts  is  not  the  watch. 
For  no  chance  arrangement  of  parts  can  pro- 
duce a  mechanism;  it  is  not  the  sum,  but  the 
ordered  connection  of  the  parts  which  makes 
the  watch,  the  engine,  or  the  machine.  And, 
in  the  case  of  an  organism  whose  parts  are 
held  together  and  co-ordinated  by  the  mysteri- 
ous bond  of  life,  can  we  say  the  whole  is  equal 

68 


THE  WHOLE  AND  THE  PART         69 

to  the  sum  of  its  parts  ?  Try  the  experiment; 
analyze  the  plant,  dissect  the  animal,  and  then 
essay  a  summation  of  the  parts.  We  soon  dis- 
cover that  it  is  an  irreversible  process.  Either 
dissection  kills  that  which  it  investigates,  or 
that  which  it  investigates  is  dead  already.  A 
living  whole  is  never  discovered  by  a  mere  put- 
ting together  of  its  parts.  Goethe  long  ago 
exposed  this  folly: 

"  Wer  will  was  Lebendigs  erkennen  und  beschreiben 
Sucht  erst  den  Geist  heraus  zu  treiben, 
Dann  hat  er  die  Theile  in  seiner  Hand, 
Fehlt,  leider!  nur  das  geistige  Band." 

The  end  of  all  knowledge  is  the  discovery 
of  this  "vital  bond,"  the  grasping  in  a  multi- 
plicity of  details  the  one  idea  which  is  the  living 
principle  of  their  connection.  The  discovery 
of  facts  which  are  not  yet  put  together  to  form 
a  whole  is  not  knowledge.  It  is  preliminary  to 
knowledge;  but  to  know  means  to  interpret 
the  accumulated  facts,  and  to  interpret  them 
is  to  relate  them  to  some  significant  whole. 
There  are  many  to-day  who  insist  that  the 
investigator  in  the  natural  sciences,  in  political 


70        THE  WHOLE  AND  THE  PART 

economy,  in  psychology,  should  be  solely  a  com- 
piler of  facts,  and  that  the  man  of  theory  should 
give  way  before  the  man  of  facts;    for  the  fact 
is  certain,  the  theory  is  uncertain,  the  fact  is 
born  of  reality,  the  theory  is  spun  out  of  mind. 
But  every  fact,  it  must  be  remembered,  illus- 
trates some  theory,  of  w^hich  it  is  a  particular 
instance.     To  understand  a  fact,  there  must  be 
an  appreciation  of  its  relation  to  the  universal 
truth  which   it  reveals,   and   with   which   it  is 
united  by  its  unseen  but  "vital  bond."     The 
isolated  fact,  indeed,  apart  from  its  setting,  has 
no  meaning.     The  hand  severed  from  the  body 
is  no  longer  a  hand.     The  brain  in  the  jar  of 
alcohol  is  not  a  brain;    it  was  once  the  centre 
of  thought  and  feeling;    it  is  now  only  a  speci- 
men;   as  a  part  of  the  organism  it  was  every- 
thing, as  a  whole  in  itself  it  is  nothing.     Much 
1  exact  scholarship  gains  the  letter  but  loses  the 
I  spirit  of  knowledge,   because,  while  collecting 
I  the  facts,  it  fails  to  comprehend  how  they  hang 
I  together,  or  what  they  mean  in  the  light  of  a 
larger  whole. 

On  the  other  hand,  if  one  part,  however  in- 
significant,  be   rightly  interpreted,   it  will  dis- 


THE  WHOLE  AND  THE  PART         71 

cover  the  whole.  One  drop  in  the  test-tube,  a 
single  act  of  disloyalty  in  a  friend,  a  glance  of 
the  eye,  a  gesture,  a  word  too  much  or  a  word 
too  little,  and  the  whole  story  is  told.  The 
astronomer  only  needs  to  see  how  the  arc 
begins  to  round  in  order  to  construct  the  com- 
plete orbit.  The  theory  of  reasoning  rests 
upon  this  simple  principle,  that  things  are  so 
bound  together  that  a  part  may  disclose  the 
whole,  as,  when  one  picks  up  a  single  link,  the 
entire  chain  comes  with  it.  The  prophet,  for 
instance,  is  not  one  who  in  some  mysterious 
manner  sees  into  the  future.  It  is  the  present 
into  which  the  eyes  of  the  seer  must  penetrate. 
He  predicts  the  future  only  so  far  as  it  is 
wrapped  up  in  the  present.  As  Leibniz  once 
said,  "Every  present  is  big  with  the  future  and 
laden  with  the  past."  The  veil  is  not  between 
us  and  the  future;  it  is  between  us  and  the 
present.  We,  dull  of  vision,  fail  to  read  the 
signs  of  the  times.  The  parts  we  see,  but  we 
are  not  able  to  divine  the  whole. 

So  also  in  any  group  of  men,  in  a  clan,  a 
tribe,  a  society,  in  church  or  in  state,  the  whole 
is  more  than  the  sum  of  its  parts.     The  parts 


72        THE  WHOLE  AND  THE  PART 

may  be  seen,  they  may  be  counted.  We  find 
them  in  registers,  in  rosters,  in  tables  of  census 
statistics,  and  yet  the  communal  spirit  which 
makes  for  unity  and  solidarity  is  unseen.  It  is 
the  esprit  de  corps,  without  which  the  body  dies 
and  returns  to  its  elemental  parts.  And,  even 
within  the  still  larger  range  which  embraces 
the  circle  of  mankind  in  general,  the  several 
parts  are  bound  together  as  members  one  of 
another,  because  they  are  united  in  a  common 
ancestry  and  a  common  destiny,  a  common  weal 
or  woe.  The  spirit  of  humanity  makes  all  one. 
It  has  often  been  said  that  the  great  man, 
the  genius  or  the  hero,  lifts  himself  above  the 
ordinary  level  of  mankind,  and  that  he  in  no 
sense  belongs  to  the  mass,  but  is  as  one  dwell- 
ing apart,  self-sufficient,  fulfilling  the  law  of 
his  own  being.  But  the  great  man,  if  truly 
great,  belongs  in  a  peculiar  manner  to  his  day 
and  generation;  if  not,  there  is  no  arena 
wherein  his  powers  may  find  a  natural  man- 
ifestation. No  man  attains  a  place  in  the 
world's  history  save  through  the  part  which  he 
plays  among  his  contemporaries  and  in  his  own 
setting.     He  must  have  the  great  heart  and  the 


THE  WHOLE  AND  THE   PART         yj 

great  mind  himself,  and  yet  his  following  must, 
in  some  measure  at  least,  possess  the  elements 
of  greatness.  No  general  could  ever  prove  his 
greatness  with  a  battalion  of  cowards.  The 
great  prophet  must  gather  about  him  those  who 
have  not  bowed  the  knee  to  Baal;  or  who 
would  hear  his  message  .?  Luther  had  the  Prot- 
estants, Cromwell  the  Puritans,  Napoleon  his 
Imperial  Guard,  Washington  the  American 
patriots.  The  scholar  writes  for  scholars;  the 
man  of  letters  for  those  who  possess  the  respon- 
sive mind  and  taste.  Behind  the  great  masters 
of  English  there  has  ever  been  that  great  body 
of  their  fellows  who 

"  Speak  the  tongue 
That  Shakespeare  spake;    the  faith  and  morals  hold 
Which  Milton  held." 

There  is  still  another  fallacy  which  may  be 
called  the  genetic  fallacy — the  mistaken  idea 
that,  if  we  can  only  trace  a  thing  back  to  the 
part  which  forms  its  origin,  we  shall  there,  in 
that  initial  stage,  find  its  complete  explanation. 
This  is  the  day  in  which  the  method  of  evolu- 
tion prevails  throughout  every  field  of  serious 


74        THE  WHOLE  AND  THE  PART 

investigation.  Back  to  beginnings!  This  is  the 
cry  on  all  sides,  whether  the  investigation  be 
that  of  an  animal,  of  a  religion,  or  of  a  form 
of  government.  The  original  part,  it  is  urged, 
is  the  key  to  all  subsequent  processes  of  de- 
velopment. But  the  original  part  by  itself  is 
never  self-illuminating.  Even  though  in  our 
researches  we  have  succeeded  in  discovering  it, 
we  are  at  a  loss  to  interpret  its  significance. 
For  much  appears  in  any  initial  stage  which, 
in  the  process  of  development,  completely  dis- 
appears; and  much  lies  concealed  which,  nev- 
ertheless, contains  the  promise  and  potency 
of  all  that  is  to  be.  It  is  of  the  nature  of 
a  cause  to  hide  itself.  In  this  respect  it  re- 
sembles the  Deity — because  it  too  is  creative. 
The  complete  nature  of  a  cause  can  be  re- 
vealed only  through  the  whole  course  of  the  proc- 
ess of  development  which  proceeds  from  it.  If 
every  cause  manifested  itself  fully  in  its  earlier 
stages,  then  all  knowledge  would  be  attained 
by  simple  observation,  and  it  would  be  super- 
ficial at  that;  but  it  is  not.  You  may  ask,  what 
is  the  nature  of  the  seed  which  I  chance  to 
hold  in  my  hand  ?     I  do  not  know;   but  I  can 


THE  WHOLE  AND  THE  PART         75 

discover  it  readily  enough.  Sow  the  seed  in 
the  earth,  let  it  be  warmed  by  the  sun  and  wet 
by  the  rain,  let  it  grow  in  the  light  and  in  the 
night,  then  will  come  a  revelation  of  its  nature 
in  fruit  and  flower.  The  seed  does  not  explain 
the  plant;   rather  the  plant  explains  the  seed. 

No  more  is  man  satisfied  with  that  account 
of  his  nature  which  refers  him  to  his  mere 
beginnings,  and  traces  his  line  of  descent  to 
certain  "Simian  ancestors  of  arboreal  habit"; 
or,  to  go  a  stage  further  in  this  regress,  to  the 
primal  elements  to  which  his  organism  may  be 
reduced,  the  oxygen,  nitrogen,  hydrogen,  car- 
bon, and  what  not,  of  his  ultimate  origin.  Is 
man,  as  we  know  him,  as  we  know  ourselves, 
satisfactorily  explained  by  such  beginnings  ^ 
It  must  not  be  overlooked  that,  in  that  ele- 
mental stage,  there  must  have  been  a  potential 
factor  which  is  not  in  any  one  of  the  original 
parts  but  pervades  them  all,  which  elevates  the 
dust  whence  man  comes  and  hallows  it,  which 
transforms  the  beast  into  the  savage  and  the 
savage  into  the  civilized  man.  Call  it  reason, 
or  spirit,  or  soul,  what  you  will;  it  will  never  be 
revealed  at  the  beginnings  of  the  process  of  evo- 


76        THE  WHOLE  AND  THE  PART 

lution,  but  at  its  consummation.  Explanation 
does  not  look  backward  to  origins,  but  forward 
to  the  final  results  of  the  unfolding  process. 
The  process  of  development  is  a  process  of  rev- 
elation, but  its  beginnings  always  conceal  more 
than  they  reveal.  We  must  all  concede  what 
Darwin  pointedly  calls  to  our  attention,  as 
though  in  our  pride  we  needed  constantly  to 
be  reminded  of  it,  that  "man  still  bears  in  his 
bodily  frame  the  indelible  stamp  of  his  lowly 
origin."  Although  we  may  have  come  from  a 
stock  which  we  share  in  common  with  the  ape, 
nevertheless  we  have  come  a  long  way;  and 
although  we  have  risen  from  the  dust  of  the 
earth,  and  to  that  dust  we  return,  yet  the  signifi- 
cant fact  remains,  that  we  have  riseuy  and  that 
for  the  brief  space  at  least  while  thought  holds 
sway  over  our  lives  we  decline  to  be  confused 
with  this  dust  under  our  feet,  or  with  the  animal 
which  follows  to  heel,  or  which  mimics  our  bod- 
ily movements  and  gestures  as  he  chatters  to  us 
from  his  cage. 

Mr.  Spencer  finds  the  origin  of  religion  in  the 
early  superstition  of  primitive  man,  the  belief  in 
ghosts,  the  disembodied  spirits  of  heroes,  feared. 


THE  WHOLE  AND  THE  PART        77 

reverenced,  and  finally  worshipped,  appeased  by 
sacrifice,  praised  in  song,  in  dance,  and  prayer. 
But,  here  again,  religion  also  is  to  be  judged 
not  by  what  it  once  was,  but  by  what  it  has 
become  and  by  what  it  promises  to  be.  The 
early  superstition  does  not  explain  the  evolution 
of  the  religious  idea  in  its  long  course  of  de- 
velopment through  the  ages,  but  the  evolution 
of  religion  is  rather  the  development  of  purer 
forms  out  of  earlier  perverted  forms;  it  is  the 
dying  of  superstition  as  the  seed  dies  in  the 
earth,  generating  that  which  is  potentially  in 
it,  separating  the  essential  from  the  unessential, 
the  true  from  the  false,  a  revelation  of  the  inner 
significance  behind  the  symbols  of  religion,  of 
the  inner  spirit  behind  its  external  forms. 

When  we  trace  the  course  of  any  series  of 
events  backward  to  their  starting-point,  we  un- 
consciously interpret  the  initial  stage  in  the 
light  of  all  we  have  gathered  by  the  way  in  our 
return  to  it,  and  thus  we  are  apt  to  attribute 
to  the  first  term  of  a  series  a  significance  which 
is  not  its  own.  As  in  a  mathematical  series,  so 
in  any  series  of  events,  the  first  term  has  no 
meaning  whatsoever  unless  we  know  also  the 


78         THE  WHOLE  AND  THE  PART 

law  of  the  series,  how  the  subsequent  terms  are 
related  to  the  first  and  to  each  other  in  the 
manner  of  their  formation.  For  this  reason, 
we  say  that  no  history  can  be  written  by  a  con- 
temporary. The  current  events  show  their  sur- 
face significance  only.  That  which  is  wrapped 
up  in  them  will  be  revealed  in  time,  and  he 
alone  who  can  read  the  course  of  their  subse- 
quent development  is  qualified  to  judge  them 
critically. 

There  is  another  error  of  judgment  to  which 
we  are  all  liable;  it  is  the  fallacy  of  the  half 
truth.  This  is  a  substitution  of  a  part  for  the 
whole,  and  resting  satisfied  with  it  because  it  is 
thought  to  be  the  whole.  Such  a  satisfaction 
proceeds  usually  from  self-deception.  It  sig- 
nifies a  false  mental  attitude;  and  the  disas- 
trous consequence  of  such  a  deception  is  this, 
that  one  is  content  with  a  fancied  attainment 
when  he  should  be  restless  with  the  fever  of 
the  chase.  The  disaster  imminent  in  such  a 
situation  is  not  merely  that  the  half  truth  is 
substituted  for  the  whole,  but  that  further  in- 
quiry is  suspended,  and  that  which  should  be 
a  transition  stage  on  the  way  of  knowledge  is 


THE  WHOLE  AND  THE  PART         79 

complacently  regarded  as  the  journey's  end. 
Thus  we  have  partisanship  in  poHtics,  bigotry 
in  rehgion,  the  orthodoxy  which  regards  every 
differing  opinion  as  heterodoxy,  the  idealism 
that  is  unreal,  and  the  realism  which  discovers 
no  ideal,  the  egoism  which  recognizes  no  other, 
and  the  altruism  which  dissipates  itself  in  ser- 
vice of  others  at  the  expense  of  the  obligation 
owing  to  self.  How  easily  we  overlook  that 
fundamental  law  both  of  knowledge  and  of  life, 
the  law  of  complementary  adjustment,  the  fit- 
ting of  the  half  truth  to  its  other  half,  so  that  a 
balanced  whole  is  the  result.  We  gaze  so  obsti- 
nately at  the  one  side  of  the  shield  that  a  shift- 
ing of  the  point  of  view  never  suggests  itself. 
"The  tragedy  of  thought,"  says  Hegel,  "is  not 
the  conflict  of  truth  with  error,  but  of  truth 
with  truth." 

How,  then,  is  one  to  know  that  the  whole 
truth  which  he  thinks  he  possesses  is  but  the 
half  truth  and  not  really  the  whole .?  Such  a 
discovery  comes  only  to  him  who  has  an  open 
mind  and  a  spirit  of  tolerance.  The  open  mind 
is  ever  seeking  a  new  point  of  view;  the  tolerant 
spirit  is  ever  striving  to  put  itsef  in  a  sympa- 


8o        THE  WHOLE  AND  THE  PART 

thetic  attitude  to  opposing  opinions,  and  this  not 
after  the  manner  of  a  weak  concession,  but  in  the 
interests  of  a  critical  inquiry  after  truth.  For 
suppose,  upon  a  candid  examination  of  an  opin- 
ion which  is  opposed  to  the  one  we  hold,  we  find 
something  which  we  are  constrained  to  ac- 
knowledge as  true,  then  are  we  not  warranted  in 
concluding  that  it  is  the  very  portion  of  truth 
which  our  opinion  lacks  and  which  is  its  natural 
complement  ?  The  adjustment  of  the  one  to 
the  other  must  surely  lead  us  to  a  deeper  appre- 
ciation of  the  truth  in  its  entirety.  All  progress 
in  knowledge  has  been  brought  about  by  some 
such  process  as  this — a  series  of  successive  ad- 
justments arising  out  of  conflicting  opinions. 
How  many  controversies  in  religion,  in  politics, 
or  in  philosophy  have  resulted  in  the  revela- 
tion of  a  larger  truth  than  either  side  alone  had 
maintained.  The  moment  any  controversy  ap- 
pears to  be  so  one-sided  that  the  truth  is  wholly 
with  the  one  and  error  is  wholly  with  the  other, 
our  interest  in  it  immediately  ceases.  It  is  in 
clash  of  opinion  that  truth  is  provoked;  audit 
may  well  happen  that  the  one  who  traverses 
our  convictions  may  be  not  so  much  an  an- 


THE  WHOLE  AND  THE  PART        8i 

tagonist    as    a    collaborator    in    the    field    of 
research. 

Moreover  in  a  philosophy  of  Hfe  which  is  cal- 
culated to  produce  any  deep  and  permanent  sat- 
isfaction, one  must  learn  to  see  things  as  a 
whole,  and  not  in  the  isolation  of  their  detached 
parts.  Life  has  many  compensations  which 
the  whole  story  reveals,  but  which  the  sepa- 
rate incidents  here  and  there  not  only  tend  to 
conceal  but  actually  to  contradict.  It  is  only 
when  the  case  is  all  in  that  a  true  verdict  is 
possible.  Then  it  is  that  we  come  to  see  that 
things  which  are  different  need  not  be  neces- 
sarily opposed.  When  immediate  observation 
fails  to  disclose  the  complementary  part,  we 
grow  impatient,  and  although  resolute  in  action 
we  nevertheless  become  cynical  in  spirit.  It  is 
well  to  remember,  however,  that  it  is  only  in 
the  long  run  that  events  begin  to  shape  them- 
selves into  a  connected  whole,  and  the  experi- 
ences of  life  show  an  emerging  harmony  and 
unity.  But  in  the  processes  of  the  long  run 
our  staying  powers  are  put  to  a  sore  test.  We 
demand  an  immediate  demonstration  of  the  end 
in  the  beginning,  of  the  whole  in  the  part.     In 


82         THE  WHOLE  AND  THE  PART 

developing  the  full  round  of  truth,  however, 
the  time  element  must  be  reckoned  with,  and 
we  dare  not  overlook  its  supreme  significance. 
Weary  with  waiting,  we  often  magnify  a  partial 
truth  out  of  all  proportion,  and  seek  to  build 
upon  its  foundations  in  fancied  security  and 
confidence;  or  else  the  same  partial  truth  we 
repudiate  altogether  as  wholly  false  merely  be- 
cause without  the  maturing  and  tempering  of 
time  it  seems  inadequate,  unsatisfying,  impos- 
sible. The  laws  of  logic  as  well  as  the  natural 
dictates  of  common-sense  demand  a  delibera- 
tion of  judgment  which  will  refuse  to  accept  a 
plausible  truth  too  readily,  or  to  discard  too 
summarily  that  which  may  appear  at  the  first 
glance  false  and  unprofitable.  There  is  a  bal- 
ance of  mind  which  wisely  avoids  these  extremes, 
seeking  the  truth  in  patience,  testing  the  old 
and  tolerant  of  the  new. 

It  was  Spinoza  who  insisted  that  life  must  be 
viewed  as  regards  its  deeper  problems  suh  specie 
cBterjiitatis.  And  what  Spinoza  had  in  mind 
was  simply  this,  that  the  missing  part  which 
serves  to  make  whole  the  scattered  fragments 
can  never  be  adequately  supplied  in  the  mere 


THE  WHOLE  AND  THE  PART        83 

course  of  human  events  and  the  round  of  years; 
but  that  something  which  transcends  the  hap- 
penings of  time  must  find  a  place  in  our  phi- 
losophy of  life.  The  transitory  is  not  self-ex- 
planatory, nor  indeed  can  be.  Its  significance 
is  disclosed  only  in  the  eternal  complement 
which  completes  the  broken  parts.  In  this 
sense  every  truth  concerning  human  affairs  and 
human  destiny  is  partial,  and  awaits  the  great 
revelation. 


VI 

THE  GOSPEL  OF  MIGHT 

^  I  ^HE  philosophy  of  Nietzsche  is  the  procla- 
mation of  a  new  gospel — not  the  redemp- 
tion of  man,  but  his  extinction.  Man  as  a 
species  is  to  be  displaced  by  a  new  order  of 
creature,  the  superman  which  is  to  be.  Niet- 
zsche's philosophy  is  a  diatribe  against  all  exist- 
ing social  conditions  and  conventions  which 
tend  to  perpetuate  the  race  of  mankind.  Man 
as  we  find  him  to-day  is  a  conspicuous  failure. 
He  can  develop  nothing  better  along  the  old 
lines.  There  must  be  a  new  type.  And  this 
new  type  of  man  is  to  be  characterized  by  com- 
plete freedom  from  the  limitations  of  duty 
either  to  his  race  or  to  his  God.  This  superior 
representative  of  humanity  is  to  be  made  pos- 
sible by  removing  this  greatest  of  all  obstacles 
to  human  progress,  namely,  the  ordinary  con- 
siderations of  morality.  Morality  paralyzes  the 
spontaneity  of  nature;  therefore  man's  impul- 
sive powers   should  not  be  restrained   by  any 

84 


THE  GOSPEL  OF  MIGHT  85 

uncomfortable  burden  of  obligation  and  re- 
sponsibility. The  activity  of  the  superman 
must  find  its  free  and  natural  scope  in  a  sphere 
which  lies  far  "  beyond  good  and  evil." 

Nietzsche  recognizes  but  one  virtue,  that  of 
strength;  but  one  vice,  that  of  weakness.  Hap- 
piness he  defines  as  the  feeling  that  power  is 
increasing,  that  resistance  is  being  overcome. 
The  sole  pleasure  in  life  is  the  ecstasy  of  an 
overcharged  and  surging  will.  The  compel- 
ling motive  to  activity  is  not  the  will  to  live,  as 
Schopenhauer  so  persistently  urged,  but  rather 
the  will  for  power,  the  will  to  prevail  and  to 
dominate.  Nietzsche  declares,  moreover,  that 
life  gives  no  such  thing  as  true  contentment; 
for  power  is  insatiate  and  always  reaches  forth 
to  secure  more  power.  Man's  spirit  is  restless 
if  it  is  not  consciously  growing  in  strength  and 
progressing  in  power.  Therefore,  it  is  of  the 
very  nature  of  man  to  surpass  himself.  Instead 
of  the  gospel  of  love  there  is  the  gospel  of  might; 
instead  of  the  spirit  of  obedience  there  is  the 
cry  of  protest;  instead  of  the  grace  of  humility 
there  is  the  arrogance  of  pride;  instead  of  self- 
sacrifice,  self-assertion;   instead  of  the   kindly 


86  THE  GOSPEL  OF  MIGHT 

offices  of  sympathy,  the  grim  struggle  for  pre- 
eminence; instead  of  the  recognition  of  man  as 
a  brother  there  is  the  determination  to  treat  him 
either  as  a  foe  or  a  tool  to  further  selfish  ends. 

Of  all  the  virtues  to  fall  under  Nietzsche's 
condemnation,  that  of  sympathy  receives  his 
most  stinging  scorn.  He  insists  that  this  weak 
sentiment  of  sympathy  has  always  been  and 
always  will  be  an  obstructive  force  in  the  nor- 
mal development  of  humanity;  for  sympathy, 
he  declares,  is  not  only  a  waste  of  strength,  but 
it  serves  at  the  same  time  to  divert  the  natural 
energies  of  human  effort  into  channels  which 
are  economically  unproductive  and  socially  dis- 
organizing. According  to  this  prophet  of  the 
"new  dawn,"  it  is  exceedingly  significant  that 
"vigorous  eras,  noble  civilizations,  see  some- 
thing contemptible  in  sympathy,  in  'brotherly 
love,*  in  the  lack  of  self-assertion  and  of  self- 
reliance." 

Moreover,  in  the  new  era  which  he  heralds 
Nietzsche  maintains  that  the  natural  law  of  sur- 
vival must  be  given  full  and  unobstructed  play. 
Instead  of  the  complex  machinery  of  hospitals 
and   asylums  whose   particular  offices   are   the 


THE  GOSPEL  OF  MIGHT  87 

arrest  of  the  forces  of  nature  in  cases  of  impaired 
constitutions  and  chronic  maladies,  there  should 
be  given  to  these  forces  free  course  in  sifting  the 
strong  from  the  weak.  The  skill  of  the  physi- 
cian should  be  devoted  to  the  conservation  of 
the  superior  types  of  humanity  on  the  one  hand, 
and  on  the  other  to  the  art  of  relieving  society 
of  its  hampering  burdens  through  the  stern  but 
eminently  humane  processes  of  euthanasia.  The 
limits  of  the  development  of  the  race  have  been 
reached  for  the  very  reason  that  the  fundamental 
law  of  development,  the  struggle  for  existence 
and  the  survival  of  the  fittest,  has  been  neu- 
tralized by  the  weak  affections  of  pity  and  of 
kindness. 

The  distances  which  separate  men  from  their 
fellows  must  be  emphasized.  To  make  men 
equal  is  to  reduce  them  all  to  the  dead  level 
of  mediocrity.  The  pious  effort  to  elevate  the 
masses  is  as  contrary  to  nature  as  it  is  futile, 
and  futile  for  the  very  reason  that  it  is  con- 
trary to  nature.  Develop  a  few  strong  types; 
let  all  else  be  sacrificed  to  that  end. 

In  Nietzsche's  code  the  morality  of  duty,  of 
self-sacrifice,   of   sympathetic    consideration    is 


88  THE  GOSPEL  OF  MIGHT 

the  morality  for  slaves;  for  the  man  of  noble 
breed  and  noble  destiny  there  must  be  a  com- 
plete emancipation  from  the  trammels  of 
moral  compulsion.  His  impulses  should  be 
unrestrained,  his  purposes  unconfined.  He 
must  be  free,  free  as  the  beast  that  ranges  the 
forest  for  his  prey,  as  unconcerned,  as  undis- 
turbed by  any  sentiment  of  pity  or  of  fear,  as 
disdainfully  indifferent  to  the  cry  of  pain  and 
the  impulse  of  mercy.  Thus  the  great  man, 
great  in  power  and  in  possibility,  competent 
and  self-sufficient,  worthy  to  be  the  progenitor 
of  the  race  of  superman,  or  to  become  the 
superman  himself,  shall  know  no  law,  but  shall 
be  a  law  unto  himself.  He  shall  be  under  no 
compulsion  save  to  strive  for  the  pre-eminence 
to  which  nature  has  ordained  him.  For  him 
other  men,  other  lives  are  means  to  develop 
his  powers  and  manifest  his  glory.  Such  a 
being  is  a  "transition  and  a  destruction." 
"There  is  ice  in  his  laughter."  "He  is  hungry, 
violent,  lonely,  godless;  thus  the  lion's  will 
willeth  itself.  His  is  the  courage  of  hermits 
and  eagles.  He  seeth  the  abyss,  but  with  pride. 
He  seeth  the  abyss,  but  with  eagle's  eyes;   he 


THE  GOSPEL  OF  MIGHT  89 

graspeth  the  abyss  with  eagle's  claws;  such  is 
his  courage." 

Thus  Nietzsche  describes  the  lion  and  the 
eagle  in  man,  that  wild  instinct  of  power 
which  morality  has  tamed  and  the  conventions 
of  life  have  degraded  to  the  ineffectual  modes 
of  propriety  and  custom.  According  to  his 
creed  it  is  better  to  be  a  brute  than  an  ordi- 
nary man,  doomed  to  dulness.  It  is  better  to 
cherish  and  develop  our  brute  inheritance  than 
to  be  steeped  in  the  dreary  commonplaces  of 
morality. 

Who  is  my  neighbor  ?  Nietzsche  answers, 
*'Your  work  is  your  neighbor."  And  he  adds 
that  the  man  who  loves  his  neighbor  as  him- 
self must  have  an  exceedingly  poor  opinion  of 
himself.  The  most  imperative  need  of  the  age, 
therefore,  is  a  "transvaluation  of  all  values"; 
that  is,  the  kind  of  conduct  and  of  character  to 
which  mankind  has  mistakenly  attached  value 
and  indeed  supreme  value,  must  be  superseded 
by  new  standards,  by  new  customs  and  tra- 
ditions. The  value  emphasis  must  be  placed 
upon  those  very  qualities  of  temperament  and 
disposition  which  the  teaching  and  practice  of 


90  THE  GOSPEL  OF  MIGHT 

the  centuries  have  summoned  man  to  suppress 
and  to  beat  down  under  foot.  It  is  not  merely 
that  "time  makes  ancient  good  uncouth,"  but 
that  the  very  idea  of  w^hat  is  good  has  been  and 
is  fundamentally  abnormal  and  grotesque — con- 
trary to  the  entire  economy  of  the  universe, 
wherever  that  economy  has  not  been  perverted 
by  the  artificial  conditions  created  by  man.  Hu- 
man nature  has  been  corroded  by"moralic  acid,'* 
as  this  iconoclast  of  virtue  strikingly  puts  it. 

In  this  code  of  new  values,  power  alone  is 
virtue;  the  will  to  win,  and  to  win  at  all  costs, 
the  only  disposition  worthy  of  praise  and 
emulation.  The  measure  of  success  will  then 
be  the  sole  standard  of  conduct.  Whatever 
prospers  will  be  proved  right;  whatever  fails, 
wrong.  What  one  can  do  will  be  the  only  limit 
of  what  he  may  do.  The  supreme  obligation 
of  life  will  be  the  duty  to  forget  that  there  is 
any  such  thing  as  obligation. 

The  Dionysian  view  of  life  which  Nietzsche 
so  eloquently  advocates — the  free  play  of  fancy 
and  feeling,  delight  in  the  joy  of  living,  follow- 
ing the  lead  of  the  impulsive  will — this  appeals 
to   many  in  our  day  particularly  who  crave  an 


THE  GOSPEL  OF  MIGHT  91 

unrestrained  freedom  to  be  and  to  do  and  to 
get  whatever  the  wild  impulse  of  nature  may 
suggest.  They  would  not  express  their  phi- 
losophy of  life  quite  as  crudely  and  as  nakedly 
as  this  prophet  of  the  superman.  They  would 
shrink  possibly  from  acknowledging  even  to 
themselves  their  repudiation  of  the  customary 
morality  of  their  day;  nevertheless  they  order 
their  lives  after  the  manner  of  privileged  char- 
acters who  have  done  with  the  old-fashioned 
idea  of  duty  and  its  claims  upon  them.  They 
are  not  of  the  herd,  and  they  do  not  propose 
to  be  handicapped  by  the  petty  obligations 
which  the  common  run  of  mankind  must  as- 
sume. They  believe  that  somehow  success 
carries  with  it  a  charter  of  freedom,  if  not  of 
license;  and  that  a  moral  code  can  be  made 
to  order,  peculiarly  adapted  to  the  needs  and 
purposes  of  the  individual  after^  the  manner  of 
all  his  other  possessions. 

It  is  indeed  a  very  common  opinion  that  the 
man  of  genius  is  exempt  from  the  criticism 
naturally  attaching  to  the  moral  delinquencies 
of  the  ordinary  person.  He  is  not  like  other 
men,  and   therefore  his  extraordinary  powers 


92  THE  GOSPEL  OF  MIGHT 

entitle  him  to  extraordinary  consideration.  If  a 
man*s  public  life  merit  praise  and  fame,  his 
private  life,  which  may  deserve  in  itself  public 
censure,  should  nevertheless  be  relegated  to  the 
shadows  of  silence.  The  greatness  of  the  per- 
son sanctions  the  cha  acter  of  his  pursuits  and 
pleasures.  From  such  a  point  of  view,  attain- 
ment covers  a  multitude  of  sins.  It  is  of  course 
very  convenient  at  times  to  defend  in  the  rubrics 
of  a  philosophical  cult  certain  actions  which  an 
old-fashioned  view  of  things  would  unhesitat- 
ingly pronounce  wrong  and  unworthy. 

The  fundamental  fallacy  in  the  gospel  of 
Nietzsche  and  the  fallacy  in  the  creed  of  his 
following,  whether  called  by  his  name  or  not, 
is  this,  that,  while  willing  to  sacrifice  everything 
for  the  sake  of  power,  they  overlook  the  sig- 
nificant fact  that  the  stability  of  power  may 
depend  upon  those  very  elements  which  are 
sacrificed  in  order  to  secure  it.  Power  may  be 
bought  at  too  dear  a  price,  particularly  if  we 
rob  ourselves  to  pay  for  it.  The  power  which 
man  merely  acquires  externally,  and  which  he 
may  use  as  an  instrument  or  as  a  weapon,  may 
leave  the  man  himself  all  the  weaker  for  its 


THE  GOSPEL  OF  MIGHT  93 

possession.  The  power  which  is  detached  from 
the  strength  of  personaHty  and  in  no  sense  rep- 
resents the  man  is  the  kind  of  power  which 
will  be  used  irresponsibly  and  in  all  probability 
disastrously.  Whenever  there  is  power  which 
is  gained  in  defiance  of  the  clear  distinctions  of 
right  and  wrong,  power  breeding  power  without 
let,  the  character  is  left  defenceless  under  the 
stress  of  storm,  when  the  strength  of  the  person 
rather  than  the  power  of  his  possessions  is  tested. 
Of  what  avail  is  it  if  one  is  strong  merely  in 
what  he  has,  but  weak  in  what  he  is  .?  The  cru- 
cial tests  of  life  measure  the  man  himself — and 
not   that   which  merely  pertains  to  him. 

Power  shines  in  its  glory  only  when  it  is  tem- 
pered by  wisdom  and  reverence.  Stript  of  its 
moral  setting  and  support,  it  begets  the  lust  of 
power,  and  the  lust  of  power  develops  the 
brute  in  man.  We  admire  the  brute  in  the 
brute,  but  not  the  brute  in  man;  for  then  the 
man  dies  that  the  brute  may  live.  Man  may 
possess  the  light  of  reason,  but  how  often,  as 
Mephistopheles  says: 

"  Er  braucht's  allein 
Nur  Ihierischer  als  jedes  Thier  zu  seyn." 


94  THE  GOSPEL  OF  MIGHT 

I  do  not  believe  that  there  can  ever  be  evolved 
a  higher  type  of  being,  that  myth  of  the  fancy 
— the  superman,  by  fostering  the  lowest  that  is 
in  our  present  race  and  ignoring  the  highest. 
Nor  do  I  believe  that  the  line  of  human  prog- 
ress is  to  return  upon  itself  and  draw  back 
to  the  elemental  instincts  and  appetites  of  the 
wild  beast  whose  right  is  his  might,  whose  de- 
sire is  its  own  sanction.  The  power  that  is 
bred  of  impulse,  that  is  developed  without  the 
labor  of  sacrifice  and  discipline,  that  knows  no 
law  of  justice  or  of  honor,  that  is  faithless  to 
friend  and  cruel  to  foe,  such  power  creates  in 
itself  the  forces  which  make  for  its  own  dis- 
integration and  destruction. 

When  one  is  overpowered  with  the  conscious- 
ness that  he  belongs  to  a  superior  order  of 
being,  superior  by  virtue  of  his  mental  endow- 
ment, his  possessions  or  his  position,  that  per- 
son is  doomed.  No  enemy  without  is  so  great 
a  menace  as  this  foe  within.  He  may  fear  no 
foe;  but  his  danger  lies  in  the  fact  that  he  does 
not  fear  himself.  There  is  always  a  subtle 
undermining  of  power  in  the  idea  which  one 
may  cherish  that  fate  has  elevated  him  above 


THE  GOSPEL  OF  MIGHT  95 

his  fellows  in  order  that  they  may  serve  his 
purposes,  enhance  his  fame,  and  minister  to 
his  vanity.  For  while  he  may  look  down  upon 
them  in  arrogant  pride,  sensitive  to  their  ap- 
plause, but  disdaining  thejr  touch,  and  while  he 
may  hold  his  head  high  above  the  level  of  the 
crowd,  nevertheless  that  man  stands  upon  feet 
of  clay.  Nietzsche  expresses  the  desire  that  he 
may  be  a  light  to  men,  not  to  lead  them  but  to 
blind  them.  Such  a  light  burns  inward  as  a 
fire,  consuming  its  own  sources.  It  is  charac- 
teristic of  the  small  man  to  make  others  aware 
of  their  insignificance.  But  it  is  the  glory  of 
the  great  man  to  render  others  conscious  of  the 
possibility  at  least  of  their  own  greatness.  In 
contact  with  his  personality  power  is  imparted 
by  a  subtle  process  of  moral  induction. 

Put  to  the  only  test  which  could  possibly 
have  any  significance  whatsoever  for  Nietzsche 
himself,  namely,  the  test  of  survival  and  per- 
manency, the  power  which  he  extols  is  seen  to 
fall  of  its  own  weight.  It  is  self-destructive. 
It  overreaches  itself  and  cannot  hold  what  it 
would  grasp,  nor  can  it  sustain  itself  in  the 
heights  to  which  it  fain  would  rise.    The  power 


96  THE  GOSPEL  OF  MIGHT 

which  is  subversive  of  the  moral  order  of  the 
world,  which  operates  in  disregard  of  the  com- 
mon rights  of  man  and  in  defiance  of  the  laws 
of  God,  which  erupts  in  tyranny  and  oppres- 
sion, such  power  does  not  tend  to  produce  a 
new  order  of  being,  representing  a  more  perfect 
type  of  humanity,  or  shall  we  say  superhu- 
manity. 

If  the  superman  is  to  live  his  life  "beyond 
good  and  evil,"  he  will  surely  not  live  long.  His 
fellow-supermen  will  claim  a  like  immunity  from 
moral  restraint;  they  too  will  be  driven  by  the 
greed  of  gain  and  the  lust  of  power;  they  too 
will  be  without  bowels  of  mercy,  implacable,  re- 
lentless, knowing  how  to  hate  and  to  destroy. 
The  possibility  of  the  goodly  company  of  super- 
men, of  the  Nietzschean  breed,  is  one  which  the 
imagination  may  well  dwell  upon  with  reward- 
ing amusement,  if  not  with  profit. 

I  do  not  believe  that  it  is  possible  to  develop 
a  race  in  the  lines  of  progress,  or  to  evolve  a 
wholly  new  race  by  creating  conditions  of  ex- 
treme individualism,  and  causing  them  to  pre- 
vail. If  the  individual  is  to  be  improved  through 
the  sacrifice  of  the  many,  the  deterioration  of  the 


THE  GOSPEL  OF  MIGHT  97 

many  will  inevitably  react  upon  the  individ- 
ual, menacing  his  attainment  and  Hmiting  his 
progress.  The  Burbank  blackberry  or  plum 
may  be  propagated  by  a  process  of  destroying 
thousands  of  plants  that  one  may  flourish  and 
become  the  progenitor  of  a  new  species.  Man, 
however,  is  bound  to  man  by  different  ties. 
The  human  species  is  not  represented  by  the 
individual  as  such,  regarded  solely  in  the  light 
of  his  individuality.  For  the  mere  individual  is 
not  wholly  a  man.  The  man  is  essentially  a 
being  whom  to  know  aright  and  to  appreciate 
at  his  full  significance  is  to  know  in  the  light 
of  the  relations  which  he  sustains  to  his  fellows. 
The  real  man  is  the  man  in  his  human  setting. 
The  detached  person  whether  isolated  volun- 
tarily as  the  hermit,  or  involuntarily  as  the 
exile,  is  so  far  forth  less  a  man.  And  the  same 
is  true  in  the  case  where  the  isolation  is  effected 
through  the  pride  of  that  superior  power  which 
delights  in  emphasizing  the  distance  between 
man  and  man.  Nietzsche  hates  above  all  things 
the  spirit  of  democracy.  He  abhors  the  masses, 
their  murmurings  and  complaints,  their  cheap 
pleasures,  their  vulgar  ills  and  needs.     Let  the 


98  THE  GOSPEL  OF  MIGHT 

great  man,  he  would  insist,  free  himself  from 
the  crowd,  proving  his  superiority  and  pro- 
claiming his  disdain. 

It  might  be  well  to  ask,  however,  who  are 
the  great  men  of  the  world,  as  the  world  counts 
greatness  ? 

They  are  the  men  who  in  their  greatness 
are  in  some  measure  representative.  They  are 
not  a  spectacle  for  others  to  admire  or  to  fear. 
They  are  in  one  way  and  another  the  champions 
of  the  cause  of  humanity.  Their  power  be- 
comes a  part  of  the  vigor  of  the  social  group 
of  which  they  are  members.  They  are  the 
mind  to  think,  the  voice  to  speak,  and  the 
strong  arm  to  act  for  their  moral  constituency. 

Throughout  the  records  of  history  the  su- 
preme manifestations  of  power  have  been  the 
instances  of  concerted  action  where  the  indi- 
vidual feels  himself  one  with  his  comrades, 
where  shoulder  touches  shoulder  in  the  fight, 
and  the  distinction  of  the  leader  is  merged 
in  the  glory  and  the  claims  of  his  cause.  The 
great  man  always  and  everywhere  is  he  who 
is  consecrated  to  a  cause  which  is  greater  than 
himself.     The    spirit    of   loyalty    tempers    his 


THE  GOSPEL  OF  MIGHT  99 

power;  makes  him  wise,  just,  self-governed. 
But  the  spirit  of  loyalty  cannot  exist  and  flour- 
ish in  a  nature  which  has  no  reverence  for  any- 
thing higher  than  itself.  The  old  mythology 
had  a  solid  basis  of  truth  in  its  belief  that 
Zeus  fearing  that  the  entire  race  of  mankind 
should  be  exterminated  came  to  their  rescue, 
bringing  with  him  reverence  and  justice,  to  be 
the  law  of  conduct,  the  bond  of  friendship,  and 
the  stability  of  the  communal  life. 

The  doctrines  of  Nietzsche  have  a  wholly 
opposite  trend,  creating  a  caste  spirit  of  the 
extreme  sort,  driving  the  wedge  between  master 
and  man  everywhere.  In  the  midst  of  the 
democratic  institutions  of  our  modern  life,  he 
would  constitute  a  mediaeval  feudaHsm  wherein 
the  mere  good  pleasure  of  the  over-lord  is  law 
to  the  serf.  He  would  start  centrifugal  forces 
at  work  in  society  which  separate  man  from 
man,  and  destroy  the  organic  centres  of  sta- 
bility,— the  home,  the  church,  and  the  state. 
He  would  concentrate  power  and  wealth  in  an 
oligarchy  of  superior  creatures  who  know  no 
law  but  that  of  their  own  convenience  and  se- 
curity.    Nietzsche  overlooks  the   fact,  or  else 


100  THE  GOSPEL  OF  MIGHT 

in  his  irresponsible  vagaries  he  ignores  it,  that 
human  power  is  of  sHght  avail  if  the  only  ma- 
chinery to  which  it  can  be  applied  is  hopelessly 
out  of  gear. 

Nietzsche's  message  to  his  age  he  puts  into 
the  mouth  of  the  mythical  personage,  Zara- 
thustra,  who  moves  among  men  but  is  not  of 
them,  who  speaks  as  an  oracle,  herald  of  the 
superman,  "strong  as  the  morning  sun  com- 
ing from  dark  mountains,"  prophet  of  the  new 
day  and  the  "great  noon."  His  is  a  mirthless 
laughter,  a  cynical  joy,  a  wild  wisdom.  His 
happiness  is  in  the  terror  of  the  spirit.  "  Free 
from  the  happiness  of  slaves,  saved  from  God 
and  adorations,  fearless  and  fear-inspiring,  great 
and  lonely,"  such  is  Zarathustra,  Nietzsche's 
ideal  of  the  hope  of  mankind,  the  ideal  which  he 
felt  that  he  himself  had  in  some  measure  real- 
ized. Zarathustra  comes  into  the  market-place 
from  the  wilderness  and  mountains;  his  mes- 
sage is  delivered  and  to  the  mountains  and  wil- 
derness he  returns.  He  judges  the  life  of  man  as 
one  having  no  part  in  it.  His  judgment  is  con- 
demnation. He  passes  through  the  world  as  a 
storm  moves  over  fair  fields;  in  its  wake,  dis- 


THE  GOSPEL  OF  MIGHT  loi 

may  and  destruction.  For  the  world's  joy, 
Zarathustra  has  only  a  sneer;  for  its  sorrows, 
scorn;  for  its  frailty,  ridicule;  for  its  achieve- 
ment, contempt;  for  its  hope,  a  curse.  If  this 
is  the  prophet  of  the  new  era,  what  will  its 
messiah  be?  Who  will  restore  when  all  is 
destroyed  ^ 

I  do  not  believe  in  a  new  world  which  is 
essentially  of  such  a  nature  that  it  can  be 
evolved  only  out  of  the  ashes  of  the  old.  If 
the  continuity  of  the  past  is  to  be  wholly  broken, 
if  all  history  is  to  be  wiped  out,  if  the  old  order 
is  to  be  completely  destroyed,  what  pledge  have 
we  of  the  new  ?  "One  must  have  chaos  within 
to  enable  him  to  give  birth  to  a  dancing  star." 
"Thus  spake  Zarathustra."  Beneath  all  fig- 
ure and  epigram,  however,  there  is  this  funda- 
mental idea  of  Nietzsche's  philosophy  of  life^ 
that  in  the  old  order  there  is  nothing  worthy  of 
conservation  to  form  the  beginnings  of  the  new. 
**0  my  brethren,"  says  Zarathustra,  "not 
backwards  shall  your  nobility  gaze,  but  forward! 
Expelled  ye  shall  be  from  all  fathers'  and  fore- 
fathers' lands!  Your  children's  land  ye  shall 
love  (be  this  love  your  new  nobility)  the  land 


102  THE  GOSPEL  OF  MIGHT 

undiscovered,  in  the  remotest  sea!  For  it  I  bid 
your  sails  seek  and  seek!  In  your  children  ye 
shall  make  amends  for  being  your  father's  chil- 
dren. Thus  ye  shall  redeem  all  that  is  past!" 
I  must  confess  that  I  do  not  see  how  the  expec- 
tation of  a  new  world  can  be  rationally  justified 
if  the  past  must  be  acknowledged  a  complete 
and  dismal  failure.  He  who  despises  the  past 
should  be  naturally  sceptical  of  the  future. 
Any  philosophy  of  life  is  under  suspicion  which 
seeks  to  destroy  and  not  fulfil  the  promise  of  the 
years  that  are  gone,  and  which  does  not  build 
upon  the  foundation  of  human  nature  as  it  has 
proved  itself  to  be,  but  rather  upon  that  which 
with  wild  fatuity  we  may  wish  it  to  become. 

If  we  are  to  look  forward  to  a  new  heaven  and 
a  new  earth — a  universe  without  God  and  with- 
out man,  where  the  Zarathustrian  race  shall 
flourish,  then  as  this  great  cosmic  drama  is 
being  enacted,  set  to  the  wild  strains  of  the 
Dionysian  chorus,  an  inevitable  question  will 
arise.  Is  this  a  comedy  or  a  tragedy .? 


VII 

THE   DIALECTIC   IMAGINATION 

TT  Is  no  doubt  natural,  to  associate  the  play 
of  the  imagination  exclusively  with  the 
artistic  temperament,  and  to  think  that  it 
has  no  place  in  the  experience  of  one  who  is 
immersed  in  the  busy  affairs  of  hfe  and  is 
brought  into  daily  contact  with  plain  facts  and 
prosaic  situations.  On  the  contrary,  however, 
there  Is  a  very  important  function  which  the 
Imagination  performs  in  the  more  sober  proc- 
esses of  reason  as  well  as  In  the  flights  of  fancy. 
In  matters  of  sentiment,  of  feeling,  of  taste, 
the  Imagination  appears  at  play.  In  the  offices 
of  reason  it  serves  quite  a  different  function. 
It  is  there  the  imagination  at  work.  It  is  the 
efficient  imagination.  The  phrase,  the  dialectic 
Imagination,  will  express  this  pecuHar  function 
— that  of  facilitating  the  work  of  the  reason  in 
the  effort  to  solve  the  matter-of-fact  problems 
of  life.     It  is   a   function  which   is  essentially 

logical. 

103 


104     THE  DIALECTIC  IMAGINATION 

This  is  the  kind  of  imagination  which  builds 
upon  fact.  It  is  not  merely  the  plaything  of 
the  fancy;  it  is  an  instrument  of  the  reason. 
The  business  of  interpreting  the  every-day  ex- 
periences of  life,  and  compelling  them  to  serve 
ends  of  the  greatest  efficiency,  is  an  art  which 
in  an  especial  sense  is  dependent  upon  the  col- 
laboration of  the  imagination.  The  imagina- 
tion thus  acts  as  the  conceiving  function  of 
thought.  It  is  the  eye  of  the  mind.  A  fact,  as 
a  brute  fact  merely,  is  a  matter  of  simple  obser- 
vation. The  imagination  is  the  mind's  contri- 
bution to  the  given  fact.  No  fact  by  itself  is 
self-illuminating.  It  is  like  a  diamond  which 
is  placed  in  a  dark  room.  The  light  of  a  well- 
furnished  mind  must  illumine  the  fact  before  it 
will  flash  back  its  radiance.  It  is  the  inner 
vision  alone  which  is  capable  of  interpreting 
what  the  outer  vision  merely  reports.  We  some- 
times have  to  shut  our  eyes  in  order  to  see. 
The  hidden  significance  which  any  fact  may 
possess,  its  relation  to  other  facts,  what  it  may 
suggest,  its  value  in  terms  of  the  uses  to  which 
it  may  be  put,  all  arise  from  the  activity  of  the 
imagination.     Every  fact — that  is,  every  signif- 


THE  DIALECTIC  IMAGINATION      105 

icant  fact — is  to  the  mind  so  much  raw  mate- 
rial, suggestive  of  indefinite  possibihties.  It  has 
to  be  fashioned  by  the  thought.  It  is  to  the 
mind  what  the  block  of  marble  is  to  the  fancy 
of  the  sculptor.  It  must  be  dominated  by  an 
idea — that  is,  by  the  imagination. 

A  resourceful  man  in  dealing  with  the  every- 
day facts  of  experience  must  be  able  to  picture 
them  in  a  variety  of  possible  settings  and  rela- 
tions. He  should  possess  what  I  would  call 
the  hypothetical  instinct — that  is,  the  art  of 
suggesting  certain  suppositions  and  of  premis- 
ing their  necessary  consequences.  It  is  the 
ability  to  see  the  effect  in  the  cause  and  the  cause 
in  the  effect.  The  one  who  may  have  this  gift 
is  able  to  perform  a  series  of  ideal  experiments 
with  the  facts  in  his  possession.  It  is  not 
necessary  to  put  them  to  any  actual  test;  in 
all  probability  it  will  be  impossible  or  at  least 
impracticable  to  do  so.  His  imagination,  how- 
ever, can  sketch  in  fancy  various  probable  re- 
sults, which  he  will  therefore  accept  or  discard 
as  a  reasonable  working  hypothesis  according 
to  their  promise  of  rewarding  realization.  A 
skill  in  supposition  is  merely  a  phase  of  the  art 


io6     THE  DIALECTIC  IMAGINATION 

of  imagination.     It  is   an  exercise   in   applied 
logic. 

Our  body  of  knowledge  is  nothing  more  than 
an  amorphous  mass  of  unrelated  facts  unless  it 
is  touched  by  the  imagination.  The  fancy  gives 
form  to  knowledge,  relating  part  to  part  and 
part  to  the  whole.  It  exercises  the  art  of  gen- 
eralship in  massing  facts  in  proper  order  and 
sequence,  and  in  directing  their  movement  ac- 
cording to  a  comprehensive  plan.  Knowledge 
must  have  life  also  as  well  as  form.  Fact  with- 
out fancy  is  dead.  The  imagination,  therefore, 
must  be  summoned  in  order  to  give  to  the  body 
of  knowledge  the  spirit  of  life. 

In  all  reasoning  the  mind  puts  together  its 
material  in  some  new  combination  possessing  a 
significance  which  the  various  parts  taken  sep- 
arately could  not  in  the  remotest  manner  reveal. 
The  ingenious  power  to  work  out  new  combina- 
tions of  old  material  is  the  peculiar  function  of 
the  imagination,  which  in  this  manner  gives  a 
touch  of  originality  even  to  the  most  common- 
place tasks  of  life.  By  the  constructive  proc- 
esses of  the  imagination  every  form  of  activity 
is  widened  in  scope  and  deepened  in  efficiency 


THE  DIALECTIC  IMAGINATION      107 

by  the  brooding  thought  which  sees  things  in 
the  hght  of  what  they  may  become.  It  is  the 
imagination  which  sees  the  need  and  is  capable 
also  of  devising  the  means  to  meet  it. 

This  provokes  necessarily  a  critical  spirit,  a 
spirit  of  restlessness  which  chafes  under  the 
imperfections  of  the  present  because  a  vision 
of  a  better  future  sways  before  it.  The  discon- 
tent which  is  resourceful  always  acts  as  a  spur 
to  the  imagination.  It  is  essentially  the  spirit 
of  progress  which  discovers  the  possibility  of  im- 
provement and  presses  toward  its  realization. 
An  unimaginative  people  are  proverbially  un- 
progressive.  They  are  satisfied  with  the  present 
because  they  see  no  future.  "Where  there  is  no 
vision  the  people  perish."  However,  the  vision 
which  comes  to  the  prophet  or  to  the  far-seeing 
statesman  is  not  merely  the  chance  creation  of 
the  fancy.  It  is  not  the  poet's  vision.  It  is  not 
the  outcome  of  a  fugitive  thought  or  a  chance 
suggestion.  The  imagination  which  discerns 
the  future  is  the  imagination  which  sees  and  is 
able  to  interpret  the  necessary  implications  of 
the  present.  The  seer's  vision  must  be  founded 
upon  insight;    otherwise  his  foresight  can  have 


io8     THE  DIALECTIC  IMAGINATION 

no  substantial  basis  in  reality.  The  imagina- 
tion pictures  the  future  significantly  only  when 
the  future  appears  as  a  necessary  consequence 
of  present  conditions.  It  does  not  merely  come 
after  the  present;  it  grows  out  of  it.  To  see 
what  underlies  the  present,  is  to  see  beyond  it. 
How  can  we  know  what  is  possible  unless  at  the 
same  time  we  are  able  to  penetrate  beneath  the 
surface  of  what  is  actual  ?  Penetration,  indeed, 
is  the  root  of  prophecy.  The  imagination, 
therefore,  cannot  swing  clear  of  the  reason. 
Although  in  a  certain  sense  the  imagination  is 
free,  yet  nevertheless  it  is  conditioned.  Its  de- 
pendence in  this  phase  of  its  activity  is  upon 
the  guidance  of  the  reason,  and  that  in  no  sense 
is  a  limitation  of  its  real  freedom.  That  is  a 
poor  freedom  indeed  which  scorns  the  lead  of 
the  reason,  for  the  fancy  which  waits  upon  wis- 
dom has  by  no  means  lost  its  spontaneity  or  the 
spirit  of  originality.  The  imagination  in  its 
aesthetic  ven  ures  may  enter  a  region  where  the 
prosaic  circumstances  of  life  and  the  actual 
conditions  of  existence  are  consciously  left  be- 
hind; but  throughout  this  sphere  it  is  the  im- 
agination at  play  rather  than  the  imagination 


THE  DIALECTIC  IMAGINATION      109 

at  work.  Even  here  it  might  be  shown  that  the 
play  of  the  fancy  must  indirectly  at  least  obey 
those  rules  of  the  game  which  reality  prescribes 
and  reason  formulates.  The  unreal  world  of 
adventure,  romance,  or  poetry  must  neverthe- 
less present  a  show  of  verisimilitude. 

My  contention  is  simply  that  the  work  of  life, 
however  prosaic  it  may  seem  to  be,  calls  for  an 
imaginative  mind — a  mind  of  vision  and  yet 
not  visionary,  fertile  in  device  and  yet  withal 
essentially  reasonable,  grounded  in  common- 
sense  and  yet  not  a  slave  to  the  obvious,  emi- 
nently capable  of  meeting  the  possibilities  of 
the  future  because  appreciative  of  the  signifi- 
cance of  present  condition  and  circumstance. 
Reason  without  the  imagination  is  impotent. 
It  may  be  able  to  deal  with  the  commonplace 
and  the  routine,  but  it  is  feebly  inadequate  to 
cope  with  hidden  possibilities.  It  is  quite  con- 
tent to  follow  with  the  crowd,  and  to  do  the  or- 
dinary and  the  usual.  It  sees  the  actual,  but 
overlooks  those  elements  of  a  potential  nature 
in  which  the  secret  of  success  may  be  discovered. 
It  moves  in  the  round  of  habit,  but  blazes  before 
it  no  path  of  progress  or  way  of  reform.     Its 


no      THE   DIALECTIC  IMAGINATION 

conservatism  is  a  concession  to  inertia  rather 
than  adherencefto  principle. 

Custom  is  the  natural  anaesthetic  both  of  the 
mind  and  of  the  will.  And  if  a  man's  imagina- 
tion is  deadened  by  disuse,  he  can  never  think 
vigorously  or  see  keenly.  He  yields  to  the  cir- 
cumstances which  confront  him,  and  is  not 
able  to  overcome  the  inevitable  obstacles  or 
compel  them  to  serve  his  purposes.  He  is  blind 
to  opportunity  and  has  never  heard  the  challenge 
of  circumstance.  He  has  no  desire  to  invade 
the  regions  of  the  possible.  The  unimagina- 
tive mind  is  the  dull  mind,  plodding  and  per- 
severing, it  may  be,  but  with  no  vital  touch. 
It  is  so  dominated  by  the  usual  and  the  or- 
dinary that  it  is  inhospitable  to  those  larger 
ideas  which  tend  to  provoke  its  hidden  powers. 

The  mind  not  only  deals  with  facts  and 
things,  but  it  has  to  do  with  persons  as  well. 
To  live  with  men,  to  work  with  them,  to  control 
and  direct  them,  to  understand  them,  to  bear 
with  them,  to  accommodate  oneself  to  their 
ideas,  requires  a  special  gift  which  is  very  inti- 
mately dependent  upon  the  imagination.  It  is 
the  art  of  picturing  to  ourselves  the  point  of  view 


THE  DIALECTIC  IMAGINATION      in 

of  the  other  man  and  of  leading  him  also  to  see 
our  point  of  view.  It  is  an  appreciation  which 
is  born  of  sympathy;  and  sympathy  is  only 
a  special  phase  of  the  imagination.  To  know 
the  possibilities  of  men  is  a  higher  art  than  to 
know  the  possibilities  of  things.  There  is  no 
gift  of  such  incalculable  value  to  one  in  admin- 
istrative control  as  the  ability  to  recognize  the 
coming  man,  and  discount  his  future  efficiency 
and  usefulness.  To  understand  what  men  think, 
and  especially  what  they  feel,  to  appreciate 
their  needs  and  desires,  their  weaknesses  and 
limitations  as  well  as  their  strength,  requires 
a  power  of  divination  in  a  consummate  degree. 
To  provoke  the  possibilities  of  others,  there 
must  be  some  range  of  fancy  within  oneself. 

The  imagination,  however,  is  not  only  the 
instrument  of  the  reason,  providing  its  premises, 
massing  its  argument,  discovering  its  proof,  and 
revealing  the  various  possibilities  of  its  appli- 
cation. It  is  more  than  this.  It  is  the  mind's 
support  in  those  long  stretches  of  patient  expec- 
tation, when  the  predictions  of  reason  have  not 
yet  been  verified  in  fact.  Imagination  is  the 
ally  of  patience.     The  intellect  has  its  need  of 


112     THE  DIALECTIC  IMAGINATION 

faith  as  well  as  man's  religious  nature.  The 
power  to  see  the  thing  that  must  be  and  to 
believe  in  its  ultimate  fulfilment, 

"  To  hope  till  hope  creates 
From  its  own  wreck  the  thing  it  contemplates," 

this  is  the  high  office  of  the  imagination. 

If,  therefore,  the  imagination  plays  this  im- 
portant role  throughout  the  whole  range  of  our 
thinking,  the  question  of  its  cultivation  becomes 
a  matter  for  serious  consideration.  It  is  a  prob- 
lem which  concerns  not  merely  the  pleasures  of 
appreciation  and  the  delights  of  the  mind,  but 
has  a  direct  and  intimate  bearing  upon  the 
efficiency  and  success  of  one's  work  itself.  For 
this  reason,  then,  there  is  a  far  greater  need  to 
exercise  the  powers  of  the  imagination  as  a 
preparation  for  the  practical  pursuits  of  life 
than  for  the  artistic.  The  artistic  temperament 
is  endowed  by  nature  with  the  imaginative  strain 
and  its  development  will  care  for  itself.  But 
with  a  mind  which  is  absorbed  in  affairs,  it  is 
far  more  imperative  that  the  imagination  should 
be  quickened  and  its  activity  fashioned  into 
habit.     It  is  rather  a  futile  task  to  attempt  the 


THE  DIALECTIC  IMAGINATION      113 

training  of  one's  power  of  imagination  in  any 
direct  manner;  it  is  quite  possible,  on  the  other 
hand,  to  produce  and  foster  an  imaginative 
habit  of  mind  by  cultivating  certain  other  habits 
vi^hich  in  turn  will  prove  tributary  to  the  end 
desired.  Imagination  is  a  spirit  which  must 
be  wooed  indirectly. 

There  is,  for  instance,  the  possibility  of 
quickening  our  powers  of  observation,  not  so 
much  as  regards  the  extent  and  accuracy  of  the 
external  sense  of  sight,  but  rather  in  respect  to 
the  inner  sense  of  interpretation  and  discern- 
ment. For  it  is  the  peculiar  function  of  the 
mind's  eye  to  correct  the  first  impressions  medi- 
ated by  the  senses,  to  amplify  them,  and,  above 
all,  to  apprehend  their  deeper  significance. 
The  vision  of  thought  always  transcends  the 
vision  of  sense.  It  was  no  flight  of  the  fancy, 
but  one  of  the  more  serious  offices  of  imagina- 
tive reason  which  was  capable  of  seeing  behind 
the  daily  rising  and  setting  of  the  sun,  the  com- 
plete Copernican  programme  of  our  solar  sys- 
tem. It  is  not  the  genius  alone  who  possesses 
this  gift.  The  art  of  seeing  beneath  the  surface 
and  uncovering  buried  meanings  is  one  in  which 


114     THE  DIALECTIC  IMAGINATION 

we  all  can  acquire  a  skill  if  we  will  only  take  the 
pains  persistently  to  exercise  it.  It  is  the  result 
of  habit  and  discipline.  It  is  no  easy  task,  but 
the  effort,  arduous  though  it  may  be,  is  abun- 
dantly repaid  by  the  result. 

There  is  still  another  habit  which  tends  to 
stimulate  our  imaginative  faculty,  namely,  the 
endeavor  in  the  exercise  of  our  memory  to  re- 
construct the  original  elements  of  an  experience 
rather  than  merely  restate  them.  The  ability 
to  recall  facts  literally  in  the  same  order  and 
relations  as  one  originally  observed  them  illus- 
trates the  lowest  order  of  memory.  The  man 
who  is  a  bore  usually  has  a  good  memory,  but 
he  has  no  imagination.  The  art  of  conversa- 
tion consists  in  a  certain  skill  of  omission  as  well 
as  that  of  emphasis.  What  not  to  say  and  what 
to  lay  stress  upon,  the  imagination  with  its  se- 
lective Instinct  alone  can  determine.  There  is 
an  art  of  forgetting  as  well  as  of  remembering. 

There  is  all  the  difference  in  the  world  be- 
tween learning  a  lesson  which  we  can  repeat 
upon  occasion  and  mastering  a  truth  so  that  it 
becomes  the  ready  servant  of  our  thought.  To 
assimilate  knowledge  rather  than  receive  it  whole 


THE  DIALECTIC  IMAGINATION      115 

requires  some  functioning  of  our  imagination,  for 
we  must  in  our  thoughts  so  transform  the  orig- 
inal elements  of  an  experience  that  we  can  free 
them  from  local  and  temporal  color  and  from 
the  setting  of  particular  circumstance,  thus  ren- 
dering them  available  for  our  purposes  in  other 
situations  of  a  wholly  different  character.  What 
we  learn  in  one  setting  we  usually  wish  to  use 
in  another,  for  experience  rarely  repeats  itself 
in  precisely  the  same  manner  or  in  the  same 
order  of  events.  It  is,  therefore,  necessary  in 
the  acquisition  of  knowledge  that  we  should 
endeavor  to  grasp  the  salient  features  of  every 
situation,  determining  their  true  significance  by 
a  sifting  process  which  will  separate  the  essen- 
tial from  the  non-essential. 

This  art  of  giving  a  universal  significance  to 
a  particular  incident  is  due  to  a  subtle  alchemy 
of  the  mind  by  means  of  which  the  elements  of 
knowledge  are  transmuted  into  forms  admitting 
of  significant  application  throughout  the  whole 
range  of  thinking  and  of  action.  To  acquire 
this  art  one  should  endeavor  to  cultivate  the 
habit  of  mastering  a  principle  rather  than  learn- 
ing a  rule.    A  principle  differs  from  a  rule  in  this 


ii6     THE  DIALECTIC  IMAGINATION 

respect  that  the  principle  can  deal  adequately 
with  the  special  case.  The  exception  never  proves 
the  rule;  it  may,  however,  disclose  some  funda- 
mental principle  which  is  capable  of  explaining 
the  exceptional  case.  That  time-honored  say- 
ing that  the  exception  proves  the  rule  is  merely 
a  mistranslation  of  the  Latin  proverb,  exceptio 
regulam  probat,  which  should  read, — the  excep- 
tion tests  the  rule.  No  rule  is  sufficiently  for- 
tified to  withstand  such  a  test  unless  there  is 
a  recognized  principle  behind  it.  A  rule  is  a 
mere  order  of  procedure,  and  one  who  has 
learned  the  rule  is  utterly  at  a  loss  whenever  a 
strange  situation  suddenly  confronts  him  to 
which  the  rule  is  not  obviously  applicable.  It 
is  necessary  for  him  to  penetrate  the  disguise  of 
the  exceptional  case  and  to  discover  the  funda- 
mental principle  behind  it;  and  this  is  itself 
an  act  of  the  imagination. 

Also  much  may  be  gained  in  increasing  our 
powers  of  imagination  by  acquiring  the  habit 
of  presenting  to  ourselves  the  problem  which 
every  significant  experience  in  life  suggests, 
namely,  that  of  economy  in  adjusting  means  to 
ends.     How  may  larger  and  more  valuable  ends 


THE  DIALECTIC  IMAGINATION      117 

be  secured  by  a  wiser  choice  of  means  ?  How 
may  present  conditions  be  improved  ?  How  may 
the  traditional  mistakes  be  avoided  ?  How 
may  we  escape  from  the  sway  of  the  common- 
place ?  These  are  some  of  the  queries  which 
tend  to  keep  the  mind  alert  and  open  to  the 
possibility  of  a  new  order  of  things.  The  habit 
of  contriving  devices  of  improvement,  or  re- 
sourceful suggestion  and  progressive  endeavor, 
is  a  constant  spur  to  the  imagination,  whose 
power  is  increased  with  every  new  demand  made 
upon  it.  Whatever  the  end  of  one's  activity 
may  be,  it  must  appear  first  of  all  in  the  form 
of  an  idea  in  the  mind,  an  idea  which  sees  the 
thing  that  ought  to  be  and  compels  its  realiza- 
tion. Reason  may  plan,  but  imagination  holds 
the  torch  to  light  the  way,  and  if  a  life  is  to  have 
intelligent  direction  and  successful  issue  it  dare 
not  scorn  the  lead  of  the  fancy  which  is  born  of 
reason. 

The  imagination,  therefore,  in  the  especial 
utility  function  which  we  have  considered  of  in- 
creasing the  sum  total  of  life's  efficiency,  is  at 
the  same  time  not  wholly  devoid  of  a  certain 
aesthetical   significance.     For   any  labor  which 


ii8     THE  DIALECTIC  IMAGINATION 

thought  expands  and  directs  according  to  a 
dominant  idea  is,  in  a  sense,  a  work  of  art. 
There  is  always  some  one  method  which  is 
superior  in  the  completeness  of  its  results  to 
any  other;  there  is  always  a  way  which  is  the 
most  direct  and  most  efficacious;  there  is  always 
a  process  which  gives  the  most  valuable  product; 
there  is,  in  short,  about  everything,  however 
prosaic  and  commonplace,  an  excellence  which 
is  ideal;  and  in  whatever  sense  it  is  ideal  it 
possesses  an  artistic  value  and  significance. 
The  craftsman  who  by  the  creative  power  of  an 
idea  discovers  a  hidden  possibility  in  his  craft 
and  realizes  it  in  actual  form  or  deed  is  in  that 
single  respect  at  least  an  artist.  It  is  the  im- 
agination which  suggests  these  possibilities  of 
excellence,  a  better  for  every  good,  and  beyond 
that  a  best  whose  shadow  falls  across  attain- 
ment as  a  challenge  and  an  inspiration. 


VIII 

THE   ART  OF  THINKING 

'T^HINKING  is  not  an  automatic  function  of 
the  brain  as  breathing  is  of  the  lungs. 
For  there  are  many  persons  who  do  not  think  at 
all,  and  yet  manage  to  exist.  Their  lives  are 
merely  a  series  of  sense-impressions  which  serve 
to  stimulate  certain  habitual  activities  within  a 
confined  range  of  daily  routine.  And  in  the 
case  of  those  whose  minds  do  aspire  to  the  dig- 
nity of  thought,  there  is  an  unlimited  variety  in 
the  method  and  the  manner  of  the  process  em- 
ployed; for  thinking  has  no  common  programme 
or  procedure.  It  is  an  accomplishment  which 
must  be  attained,  each  in  his  own  way,  and 
which  assumes  always  a  pronounced  individual 
quality.  To  obtain  a  mastery  of  the  process  of 
thought  and  direct  it  to  efficient  ends  is  an  art. 
The  very  fact  that  we  regard  it  as  such,  is  itself 
a  decided  advantage  in  our  endeavor  to  attain 

proficiency  in  its  exercise. 

119 


120  THE  ART  OF  THINKING 

As  a  science,  thinking  has  its  fundamental 
laws,  its  logic;  as  an  art,  however,  it  has  no 
body  of  set  rules  which  we  may  learn  once  for 
all,  and  ever  after. slavishly  and  blindly  follow. 
There  is  no  formula  for  wisdom.  The  art  of 
thinking  requires  a  command  of  all  the  resources 
of  skill  and  inventive  device  of  which  our  nat- 
ures are  capable.  The  true  aim  of  education 
is  to  disclose  the  secret  of  the  art.  For  educa- 
tion is  not,  as  many  mistakenly  believe,  a  process 
of  furnishing  grist  for  the  mill  to  grind;  it  is 
rather  the  work  of  constructing  and  perfecting 
the  machinery  of  the  mind  itself,  and  of  impart- 
ing the  art  of  operating  it  intelligently  as  a  mas- 
ter-workman. 

The  peculiar  task  of  the  teacher  is  that  of 
informing  the  mind  rather  than  that  of  giving 
it  information.  The  one  process  prepares  the 
mind  for  the  free  exercise  of  its  own  activities; 
the  other  merely  furnishes  it  with  so  much  to 
learn  and  so  much  to  remember.  The  training 
of  the  mind  should  always  be  regarded  as  an 
end  in  itself,  and  never  as  a  means  to  some  other 
end,  however  important  such  an  end  may  be. 

The  function  of  the  school  is  not  primarily 


THE  ART  OF  THINKING  121 

to  prepare  its  students  for  college;  nor  is  it  the 
function  of  the  college  to  prepare  its  students 
for  business  or  professional  careers.  This  idea 
of  preparation  as  the  sole  end  of  education  is 
a  fallacy  which  entails  most  disastrous  conse- 
quences. It  tends  to  induce  that  lamentable 
attitude  of  mind  which  is  always  seeking  some- 
thing for  the  sake  of  something  else.  Educa- 
tion is  far  more  than  a  preparatory  discipline, 
vague  and  indefinite  in  its  reach.  It  must  be 
capable  of  showing  by  immediate  results  some 
obvious  progress  in  the  art  of  thinking.  Noth- 
ing is  so  common  to-day  as  this  false  concep- 
tion concerning  the  chief  business  of  school  or 
college  life. 

If  a  boy  in  one  of  our  so-called  preparatory 
schools  should  be  asked,  "What  is  your  object 
in  the  work  which  you  are  doing  day  after  day 
at  school.?"  in  all  probability  he  would  reply 
without  any  hesitation  whatsoever — "To  get 
into  college."  Also  if  a  similar  question  should 
be  put  to  any  freshman  in  college,  his  reply 
would  probably  be  along  the  same  line — "To 
finish  my  freshman  year  so  as  to  become  a  full- 
fledged  sophomore."   The  senior's  answer  would 


122  THE  ART  OF  THINKING 

be  no  doubt  in  a  like  vein — "To  finish  my  col- 
lege course  and  get  out  into  the  world."  The 
school-boy's  aim  is  to  get  into  college,  and  the 
aim  of  the  college  undergraduate  is  to  get  out. 
This  is  most  surely  a  strange  anomaly.  It  is 
the  fundamental  error  of  being  willing  to  put 
forth  effort  in  daily  toil  year  by  year  without 
the  remotest  conception  of  what  result  is  desired 
or  is  desirable.  The  eagerness  to  advance  over 
so  much  ground  merely  for  the  purpose  of 
leaving  it  behind,  and  with  a  complete  incapac- 
ity to  appreciate  the  real  test  of  progress  and 
the  true  end  to  be  attained,  is  one  of  the  most 
common  and  insidious  errors  of  the  day  among 
our  students.  Education  prepares  for  one  thing 
and  for  one  thing  only — the  ability  to  think.  It 
is  a  pitiable  situation  when  a  student  is  wholly 
unconscious  of  the  main  thing  which  he  is  sup- 
posed to  be  pursuing.  Does  his  mind  work  ? 
Does  he  know  how  to  use  it .?  Is  there  unnec- 
essary friction  here  or  there  .?  Does  the  machin- 
ery at  times  seem  out  of  gear .?  These  are  the 
questions  of  chief  concern. 

Moreover,  anything  which  is  so  dignified  as  to 
be  regarded  as  an  end  in  itself,  as  the  training 


THE  ARl'  OF  THINKING  123 

of  the  mind  always  should  be,  is  for  this  very 
reason  of  distinctly  greater  value  whenever  it 
eventually  comes  to  be  used  as  a  means  to 
attain  some  other  end.  The  student  whose  en- 
deavor is  not  merely  to  amass  sufficient  knowl- 
edge to  pass  the  entrance  examinations  for  col- 
lege, but  primarily  to  acquire  the  art  of  using 
his  mind  so  as  to  produce  the  greatest  possible 
effect  with  the  least  expenditure  of  effort,  he  is 
the  one  above  all  others  who  in  my  judgment  is 
best  prepared  to  realize  to  the  full  the  possi- 
bilities of  a  college  career.  The  one  whom  we 
count  illy  prepared  for  college  is  not  as  a  rule 
the  young  man  who  lacks  a  book  or  two  of  his 
Virgil  or  Caesar,  but  the  one  who  fails  to  grasp 
the  point  of  what  he  studies,  and  does  not  know 
how  to  go  about  his  tasks  in  an  efficient  and 
masterly  manner.  The  deficiency  which  can- 
not be  made  good  is  after  all  the  qualitative  and 
not  the  quantitative  one.  A  method  of  work 
counts  far  more  than  the  knowledge  of  a  mul- 
tiplicity of  facts.  A  student  once  made  the  fol- 
lowing comment  upon  a  question  in  an  exam- 
ination paper:  "I  do  not  regard  this  a  fair 
question,  because  it  requires  thinking  in  order 


124  THE  ART  OF  THINKING 

to  answer  it  properly."  Such  a  statement  be- 
trays not  only  a  lack  of  intelligence,  but  also  of 
a  sense  of  humor  as  well. 

The  problem  which  usually  presents  itself  in 
the  education  of  a  young  boy  is  this — an  un- 
trained mind,  approaching  an  unknown  subject 
without  interest  and  without  curiosity.  A  prob- 
lem such  as  this,  wherein  all  quantities  are 
unknown  and  all  negative,  might  very  naturally 
be  regarded  as  wholly  indeterminate.  And  yet 
this  is  the  teacher's  problem,  and  it  is  one 
which  he  dare  not  regard  as  insoluble.  Ob- 
viously the  beginnings  of  a  solution  will  lie  in 
the  direction  of  stimulating  an  interest  in  the 
work  which  must  be  undertaken.  And  it  is 
just  at  this  point  that  a  very  serious  error  of 
judgment  is  often  committed;  for  in  attempting 
to  create  such  an  interest,  one's  effort  may  be 
entirely  misdirected.  It  is  not  wise  to  depend 
solely  upon  the  subject-matter  of  their  studies 
to  arouse  and  sustain  the  interest  of  students. 
The  "Arabian  Nights,"  if  written  in  Greek, 
could  hardly  suffice  to  hold  the  attention  through 
all  the  drudgery  of  the  Greek  grammar  and  syn- 
tax.    There   is   one   interest  which,   above   all 


THE  ART  OF  THINKING  125 

others,  it  is  of  paramount  importance  to  awaken 
— the  student  must  become  interested  at  the 
very  start  in  the  working  of  his  own  mind.  In 
the  process  of  mastering  the  difficulties  of  a  new 
subject  he  must  be  led  to  see  at  once  that  there 
are  certain  mental  processes  which  he  can  soon 
learn  to  perform  with  facility  and  also  with 
efficiency.  No  act  is  so  absorbing  in  interest 
as  that  which  we  are  conscious  of  doing  well. 
And  the  art  of  thinking  is  no  exception.  To 
feel  that  we  can  work  with  skill  gives  a  relish  to 
every  task,  however  difficult  it  may  be.  The 
initial  consciousness  of  power  is  the  beginning 
and  promise  of  progress. 

A  boy's  play  is  often  a  form  of  work,  and  yet 
he  throws  himself  into  it  with  untiring  enthu- 
siasm and  earnestness,  because  he  knows  the 
game  and  its  art.  Indeed  his  pleasure  in  it  is 
in  proportion  to  his  ability  to  play  the  game 
with  ease  and  skill.  How  long  would  any  one's 
interest  continue  in  his  efforts  to  learn  the  art  of 
skating,  if  his  ankles  never  recovered  from  the 
early  tendency  to  wobble,  and  if  progress  never 
passed  beyond  the  first  experiences  of  catas- 
trophes   and    bruises  ?     The    pleasure    of  any 


126  THE  ART  OF  THINKING 

sport  is  evidently  in  knowing  how.  We  enjoy 
what  we  do  well.  The  person  who  gives  up 
the  game  of  golf  in  disgust  after  futile  attempts 
to  learn  the  art  of  the  game  has  obviously  found 
no  interest  in  the  pursuit,  for  the  very  reason 
that  his  attempts  have  proved  of  no  avail,  and 
because  he  has  failed  to  acquire  any  facility 
in  drive,  approach,  or  put.  There  is  always 
a  satisfaction  in  the  free  exercise  of  any  faculty, 
whether  of  body  or  of  mind,  and  therefore  it  is 
altogether  important  that  every  student  should 
come  to  regard  the  art  of  thinking  in  much  the 
same  way  as  he  has  been  accustomed  to  regard 
skating  as  an  art,  or  swimming,  or  golf,  or  any 
other  game  which  requires  skill  and  resource. 
He  should  be  impressed  with  the  fact,  more- 
over, that  every  pursuit  has  its  own  peculiar  art, 
which  must  be  discovered  if  proficiency  in  that 
pursuit  is  to  be  attained.  There  is  a  method 
of  approach,  a  point  of  attack,  a  correct  pro- 
cedure, which  is  designated  by  the  phrase, 
"proper  form,"  and  which  constitutes  in  any 
activity  the  essential  conditions  of  most  efficient 
and  satisfactory  results.  Correct  or  proper 
form  in  this  sense  always  represents  the  method 


THE  ART  OF  THINKING  127 

of  maximum  efficiency  combined  with  mini- 
mum effort,  and  is  attained  only  through  the 
evolution  of  a  common  experience.  Thinking 
also  has  its  peculiar  and  appropriate  form,  and 
the  art  of  thinking  consists  in  acquiring  this 
form  of  procedure,  call  it  the  form  of  play,  or 
the  form  of  work,  as  you  please.  One  must 
understand  the  technique  of  his  craft.  It  is  fool- 
ish and  short-sighted  to  give  one's  time  and 
attention  wholly  to  the  matter  of  that  which 
one  learns,  and  little  or  none  to  any  inquiry 
concerning  the  method  which  is  employed  in 
the  process.  To  know  the  various  devices  by" 
which  a  mass  of  bewildering  facts  may  be  re- 
duced to  order  and  system,  to  discover  the  trail 
and  follow  it  to  the  heart  of  an  unknown  region, 
to  command  a  situation  by  understanding  it, 
to  see  the  point,  to  interpret  aright  what  is  only 
implied  or  suggested,  to  know  where  to  place  the 
emphasis,  to  discriminate  between  what  is  essen- 
tial and  what  is  accidental, — this  is  the  art  of 
thinking. 

Much  of  our  thinking  is  similar  to  the  proc- 
esses which  we  employ  in  solving  a  difficult  puz- 
zle.    There  is  a  universal  interest  in  all  forms 


128  THE  ART  OF  THINKING 

of  puzzles,  an  interest' which  is  not  confined  by 
any  means  to  the  days  of  our  childhood.  To 
solve  a  problem,  to  translate  a  sentence  whose 
interpretation  is  not  obvious,  or  to  perform  an 
experiment  in  the  laboratory, — these  are  tasks 
which  create  the  same  kind  of  interest  as  that 
which  we  feel  when  we  find  ourselves  poring 
over  an  absorbing  puzzle.  The  Latin  sentence, 
for  instance,  is  a  puzzle,  and  there  are  certain 
well-known  devices  for  disentangling  its  many 
knots  and  twists.  No  one  need  feel  hopelessly 
lost  in  the  intricate  mazes  of  the  Latin  syntax, 
if  only  he  has  learned  the  art,  or  shall  I  say, 
the  trick,  which  is  necessary.  When  the  trick 
is  once  mastered,  and  it  is  not  a  diflScult  one 
to  learn,  then  there  is  a  pleasure  in  the  act- 
ual performance  itself  of  construing  sentence 
after  sentence,  because  of  the  quiet  satisfaction 
which  we  all  feel  in  recognizing  that  what  we 
are  attempting  is  turning  out  successfully.  We 
will  always  find  sufficient  variety  in  detail  to 
stimulate  our  interest  and  not  to  deaden  it.  To 
make  such  an  experience  possible,  it  is  abso- 
lutely necessary  to  guard  against  crowding  a 
student's  mind,  and  burdening  his  memory  with 


THE  ART  OF  THINKING  129 

a  load  of  unessential  material  to  which  he  can 
see  no  point  or  bearing.  It  is  foolish  and  a 
waste  of  time  and  energy  to  teach  him  the  com- 
plete Latin  grammar  at  the  initial  stages  of  his 
study.  He  should  have  at  first  only  a  working 
knowledge  of  so  much  of  the  grammar  as  he 
will  need  in  construing  simple  sentences.  Let 
him  be  taught  the  art  of  using  knowledge  as 
rapidly  as  he  acquires  it.  The  mere  process  of 
storing  information  is  not  in  itself  desirable. 
Bonded  knowledge  is  so  much  unavailable 
energy.  As  one  learns  the  art  of  using  the 
material  at  his  command  progress  is  assured. 
On  the  other  hand,  to  crowd  the  memory  with- 
out the  active  exercise  of  the  intellect  to  accom- 
pany it,  dulls  the  mind  and  destroys  all  interest 
in  any  subject  whatsoever.  The  mind,  like  the 
body,  weakens  when  it  loses  the  power  of  as- 
similating its  food.  If  the  student  is  constantly 
given  something  to  do,  and  if  he  is  started  in 
an  unknown  field  with  a  series  of  successes,  he 
will  gain  that  confidence  which  is  necessary  to 
sustained  interest  and  persistent  effort. 

This    does    not    mean,    however,    that   only 
those  tasks  are  to  be  attempted  which  can  be 


130  THE  ART  OF  THINKING 

easily  accomplished.  One  must  learn  also  how 
to  overcome  obstinate  difficulties  and  to  perse- 
vere through  all  the  tedium  and  drudgery  which 
attend  the  early  stages  of  every  subject.  But 
the  mind  must  be  prepared  for  the  more  exact- 
ing demands  by  acquiring  a  facility  in  dealing 
with  the  complete  round  of  elementary  methods 
and  processes  peculiar  to  the  nature  of  the  sub- 
ject itself.  No  one  can  fight  without  weapons, 
nor  work  without  tools.  To  overcome  the 
difficulties  which  the  labors  of  the  mind  must 
inevitably  meet,  one  must  have  mastered  all  the 
preliminary  difficulties  of  method  and  proced- 
ure. He  is  best  prepared  to  endure  the  strain 
of  the  severer  tasks  who  has  already  gained  j 
some  consciousness  of  power  in  commanding 
the  simpler  conditions  which  the  beginnings  of 
an  inquiry  naturally  offer.  Perseverance  in 
itself  is  not  necessarily  a  virtue;  it  certainly  is 
not  if  we  are  on  the  wrong  road  or  if  we  are 
going  about  our  work  in  the  wrong  way,  and  in 
total  ignorance  of  what  is  necessary  for  success. 
It  is  a  great  mistake  to  urge  any  one  to  keep 
pushing  ahead  in  an  undertaking  when  the 
most  valuable  service   that  could   possibly  be 


THE   ART  OF   THINKING  131 

rendered   to  him  would   be  to  lead   him  back 
to  the  very  beginning.     The  conscientious  and 
plodding  worker   who   keeps   doggedly   at   his 
tasks  with  little  or  no  results  to  show  save  a 
dulling   of  the    mind    and    a    breaking   of  his 
spirit  should  never  be  commended  for  his  dili- 
gence.    He  is  the  rather  to  be  regarded  as  a 
pathological    subject.     He   needs   some   expert 
treatment.     The  diligence  which  is  ineffectual 
is  like  the  energy  which  is  expended  in  a  tread- 
mill  detached    from    any   working   machinery. 
There  is  no  output  to  it — only  weariness  and 
disgust.     There  is  no  merit  in  unavailing  virtue. 
There  is  an  error  and  a  most  prevalent  one 
that  mathematical  studies  require  some  pecul- 
iar and  especial  talent  which  if  not  possessed 
by  native  endowment  can  never  be  acquired. 
Here  again  there  is  an  art  which  can  be  ac- 
quired as  readly,  I  believe,  as  that  of  any  other 
subject.     The  point  which  should  be  particu- 
larly noted  is,  that,  without  possessing  the  secret 
of  this  art,  less  progress  can  be  made  in  the  study 
of  mathematics  than  in  any  other  subject,  and 
also  the  region  of  hopeless  confusion  is  sooner 
reached.      There   is   no   subject,   therefore,   in 


132  THE  ART  OF  THINKING 

which  so  much  depends  upon  making  a  proper 
start,  and  learning  the  proper  trick  and  form. 
If  the  approaches  are  securely  possessed,  other 
difficulties  can  be  overcome,  and  that  without  a 
loss  of  interest  in  the  subject.  It  is  impossible  ' 
to  discover  the  art  of  mathematical  thinking  by 
attempting  to  memorize  complete  demonstra- 
tions so  that  one  can  reproduce  them  word  for 
word  in  a  wholly  mechanical  manner.  It  is 
absolutely  necessary  to  understand  the  signifi- 
cance of  every  process  which  is  employed  so 
as  to  be  aware  of  the  mathematical  device  in 
attacking  the  point  to  be  proved,  or  the  prob- 
lem to  be  solved;  and  it  must  be  possible  for 
us  also  to  recognize  a  similar  method  when  we 
again  see  it.  As  a  matter  of  fact  the  devices 
which  are  ordinarily  used  in  mathematical 
thinking  are  not  many,  nor  are  they  difficult 
to  master.  They  may  all  be  grouped  under  sev- 
eral distinct  types,  a  dozen  or  more,  which  occur 
again  and  again.  When  familiar  with  them,  a 
facility  in  their  use  follows  readily,  and  the  bug- 
bear of  mathematical  studies  may  be  once  for 
all  removed.  The  subject  can  then  be  pursued 
with  pleasure  and  satisfaction;  for  there  is  a  con- 


THE  ART  OF  THINKING  133 

tinual  challenge  of  one's  inventive  powers,  whose 
exercise,  when  attended  by  a  fair  measure  of 
success,  always  creates  an  absorbing  interest, 
and  it  may  be  at  times  a  certain  fascination  as 
well. 

In  a  certain  class  in  mathematics  there  was 
a  student  who  was  most  conscientious  and  plod- 
ding and  yet  with  it  all  completely  discouraged 
in  his  work.  One  day  his  instructor  asked  him 
concerning  his  difficulties,  and  added:  "This 
subject  cannot  possibly  be  as  difficult  as  you  are 
bent  upon  making  it;  in  fact  no  subject  is  so 
hard  as  you  evidently  think  this  to  be.  You  are 
simply  wasting  your  time,  because  you  are  going 
about  your  work  in  the  wrong  way."  This  in- 
cident represents  a  very  common  experience. 
There  is  a  pitiable  waste  of  effort  in  the  most 
painstaking  tasks  of  some  of  our  students.  They 
have  never  learned  the  art  of  study.  This  want 
tends  to  create  difficulties  which  are  not  inher- 
ent in  the  subject  itself,  and  to  magnify  those 
that  necessarily  pertain  to  it. 

The  greatest  possible  obstacle  to  progress  of 
any  kind  is  lack  of  method.  Where,  however, 
the  student  has  learned  the  secret  of  making  all 


134  THE  ART  OF  THINKING 

effort  tell,  so  that  there  is  no  unrequited  toil, 
then  the  question  of  interest  in  his  work,  or 
of  the  results  that  may  be  naturally  expected, 
or  of  the  progress  that  he  may  be  making,  will 
take  care  of  itself.  Kant  has  put  the  art  of 
r-  teaching  in  a  sentence:  "I  do  not  attempt  to 

2  teach   my  students  philosophy,  but  merely  to 

7  think  philosophically." 

The  consciousness  of  the  ability  to  use  one's 
I  own  mind  is  not  of  course  the  sole  interest  in 
^  the  life  of  a  student.  But  it  is  the  initial  and 
central  interest  nevertheless;  and  other  inter- 
ests will  be  found  to  range  themselves  about  it 
as  a  nucleus.  It  is  essential  that  such  an  inter- 
est should  be  created  and  maintained  at  all 
hazards.     Start  the  beginner  on  the  right  road, 

,  point  him  straight  and  give  him  his  direction, 
and  all  else  will  follow.  A  curiosity  to  know 
the  reason  of  things,  a  critical  discernment  im- 
patient of  the  irrelevant  and  the  non-essential, 
an  appreciation  of  the  best  thought  of  others 
and  the  power  to  assimilate  it,  a  dehght  in  the 
rigor  of  reason  and  the  conquests  of  the  mind, — 
all  these  come  to  one  who  has  made  the  most 
important  of  all  discoveries,  that  his  mind  is 


THE  ART  OF  THINKING  135 

an  excellent  working  organ  which  he  has 
learned  to  guide  and  control,  and  whose  pro- 
ductive energy  is  a  continual  interest  and  pleas- 
ure. The  consciousness  of  intellectual  power 
opens  all  ways  before  him  and  speeds  him 
forward.  Many  a  prospect  lures  him.  He 
embarks  upon  many  a  voyage  of  discovery. 
Studies  are  regarded  no  longer  as  a  discipline, 
but  as  an  accomplishment.  A  restless  spirit  of 
curiosity  possesses  him.  The  fever  of  knowl- 
edge is  in  his  blood. 

On  the  other  hand,  no  one  can  become  seri- 
ously or  permanently  interested  in  the  products 
of  another's  mind  who  experiences  no  pleasure 
or  satisfaction  in  the  processes  of  his  own.  The 
power  of  appreciation  must  have  its  sources 
within.  A  young  man  in  college  who  was  heir 
to  a  large  fortune  was  asked  by  one  of  his  pro- 
fessors who  had  been  watching  his  college 
career  with  some  misgivings:  "Why  are  you 
neglecting  your  work  as  you  have  been  doing 
ever  since  you  entered  college  .?  You  are  aware 
that  you  are  to  occupy  a  most  responsible  posi- 
tion in  the  conduct  of  your  father's  estate  to 
which  you  are  the  sole  heir.     Do  you  not  care 


136  THE  ART  OF  THINKING 

to  have  brains  enough  to  enable  you  to  dis- 
charge your  duties  in  life  with  ability  and  pos- 
sibly with  distinction?"  This  evidently  did 
not  appeal  very  forcibly  to  the  young  man,  for 
he  rather  naively  replied:  "I  can  always  hire 
brains  whenever  I  need  them."  It  is  difficult 
to  say  whether  one  is  the  more  indignant  at  the 
hopeless  lack  of  any  concern  for  the  develop- 
ment of  his  own  mind,  or  at  the  complete  igno- 
rance and  disdain  concerning  the  true  value  and 
dignity  of  the  minds  of  others  which  this  re- 
mark implies. 

Of  course  no  art  can  be  learned  where  there 
is  no  earnest  purpose  to  master  it.  The  art  of 
thinking  is  no  light  undertaking.  There  must 
be  some  inner  compulsion  of  such  a  permanent 
nature  that  it  will  prove  capable  of  sustaining 
interest  and  energy  in  the  arduous  discipline 
which  this  art  demands.  It  is  not  the  teacher's 
function  to  supply  a  constant  interest,  and  to 
be  forever  vigilant  in  removing  difficulties  and 
overcoming  obstacles.  His  peculiar  gift  is  to 
free  the  mind  so  that  it  can  acquire  an  inde- 
pendence of  judgment  and  a  fertility  of  mental 
resource  which  are  the  essential  features  of  a 


THE  ART  OF  THINKING  137 

liberal  education.  While  the  teacher  should 
not  have  the  full  burden  of  the  task  of  stimu- 
lating the  student's  interest  and  sense  of  re- 
sponsibility, nevertheless  his  is  a  serious  duty  in 
this  respect  and  at  the  same  time  an  excep- 
tional privilege.  A  conspicuous  illustration  of 
the  power  of  a  teacher  to  awaken  a  mind  wholly 
unconscious  of  itself  is  given  in  the  life  of  Glad- 
stone. As  a  boy,  Gladstone  was  at  Eton  for 
three  years;  during  all  this  time  he  gave  no 
evidence  whatsoever  of  talent  or  of  taste  for 
the  things  of  the  mind.  The  following  is  the 
account  which  he  himself  gives  of  the  intellectual 
crisis  of  his  life  which  he  experienced  in  his 
Eton  days: 

**At  this  time  there  was  not  in  me  any  desire 
to  know  or  to  excel.  There  was  a  barrister 
named  Henry  Hall  Joy,  a  man  who  had  taken 
a  first  at  Oxford.  He  was  very  kind  to  me,  and 
had  made  some  efforts  to  inspire  me  with  a  love 
of  books,  if  not  of  knowledge.  Joy  had  a  taste 
for  classics,  and  made  visions  for  me  of  honors 
at  Oxford.  But  the  subject  only  danced  before 
my  eyes  as  a  will-o'-the-wisp,  and  without 
attracting  me.     I   remained   stagnant,  without 


138  THE  ART  OF  THINKING 

heart  or  hope.  A  change,  however,  arrived 
about  Easter,  1822.  My  'remove'  was  then 
under  Hawtrey  (afterward  head-master  and  pro- 
vost), who  was  always  on  the  lookout  for  any 
bud  which  he  could  warm  with  a  little  sunshine. 
It  was  entirely  due  to  him  that  I  first  owed  the 
reception  of  a  spark,  the  divines  parti culum 
aurcB^  and  conceived  a  dim  idea  that  in  some 
time,  manner,  and  degree  I  might  come  to 
know."  (Morley,  "  Life  of  Gladstone,"  Vol  I, 
pp.  29  f.) 

Every  school-boy,  it  is  true,  is  not  a  Gladstone 
in  the  making;  nor  is  every  master  a  Hawtrey. 
Nevertheless  there  is  always  the  possibility  that  j 
a  chance  spark  may  kindle  some  inflammable  | 
material.  To  quicken  the  first  flickering  flame  | 
of  knowledge  and  thereby  enable  a  student  to  | 
possess  his  own  mind — this  is  the  highest  at-  | 
tainment  and  reward  of  one  who  would  teach  I 
others  the  art  of  thinking. 


IX 

THE  VOCATION  OF  THE  SCHOLAR 

''  I  ^HE  life  of  a  scholar  is  something  more  than 
a  means  of  livelihood.  It  is  a  vocation;  and 
where  this  is  not  recognized,  the  true  scholar 
is  w^anting.  The  scholar  is  the  link  between 
the  past  and  the  present;  the  conservation  of 
knowledge  is  in  his  keeping.  His  office  is  pri- 
marily that  of  an  interpreter  of  truth;  at  times, 
however,  he  may  become  its  priest  and  prophet 
as  well.  He  springs  from  an  ancient  and  hon- 
orable lineage.  He  is  in  line  with  that  illustri- 
ous company  of  seekers  after  truth  who  have 
given  in  every  generation  an  impetus  to  the 
thought  and  progress  of  the  race. 

The  scholar  not  only  inherits  the  traditions 
established  in  the  learning  of  the  past,  but  by 
the  very  nature  of  his  labors  he  is  brought  into 
intimate  association  with  the  scholars  of  his  own 
day.  This  contemporary  contact  is  by  no  means 
the  least  of  his  privileges.  Of  course  not  all 
139 


140       VOCATION  OF  THE  SCHOLAR 

scholars  are  teachers  and  therefore  of  one  body 
by  virtue  of  their  common  interests  and  pur- 
suits. However,  no  one,  I  imagine,  will  deny 
that  the  natural  habitat  of  the  scholar  is  the 
school.  The  great  universities  of  the  Middle 
Ages  and  of  modern  times  have  been  the  homes 
of  scholars.  Without  such  a  home  the  scholar 
would  have  been  indeed  an  exile. 

There  is  an  exceedingly  significant  saying 
which  has  been  handed  down  to  us  from  the 
old  Greek  astronomer  and  poet,  Ptolemy:  *'He 
is  not  dead  who  giveth  life  to  knowledge."  This 
profound  observation  applies  in  an  especial 
sense  to  those  who  have  founded  out  educa- 
tional institutions  and  secured  them  upon  a 
permanent  basis  of  efficiency,  and  who  have 
fostered  them  in  wisdom,  faith,  and  persever- 
ance. There  are  many  ways  in  which  one  may 
give  life  to  knowledge, — by  the  spoken  or  writ- 
ten word,  by  a  new  thought,  or  through  skill  in 
putting  an  old  thought  in  a  new  form,  by  dis- 
covery, by  invention;  but  no  contribution  of  this 
kind  is  so  self-multiplying  and  so  far-reaching  in 
its  results  as  that  of  establishing  and  maintain- 
ing a  permanent  centre  for  the  diffusion  and  ex- 


VOCATION  OF  THE  SCHOLAR       141 

tension  of  knowledge;  and  at  the  same  time  to 
this  end  creating  a  community  of  scholars  with 
a  body  of  scholarly  traditions  and  a  high  stan- 
dard of  scholarly  excellence  and  ambition. 

Whenever  we  find  such  an  institution,  we  are 
at  the  sources  of  life.  For  it  represents  some- 
thing more  than  the  mere  machinery  of  educa- 
tion. The  school,  the  university,  is  never  to  be 
regarded  as  a  machine;  it  is  an  organism.  As  an 
organism  it  is  not  only  instinct  with  life  as  a 
whole,  but  the  various  parts  also  of  which  it  is 
composed  are  themselves  living  beings.  The 
forces  which  are  active  in  such  an  organism  are 
the  powers  of  personality.  The  living  spirit  of 
the  teacher  must  quicken  the  living  spirit  of  his 
student.  It  is  the  play  of  life  upon  life.  Con- 
sequently they  who  organize  these  living  forces 
of  knowledge  and  permanently  institutionalize 
them  do  not  die.  They  live  again  in  all  the 
sources  of  life  which  they  create.  They  live 
again  in  every  trained  mind  and  in  every  tem- 
pered spirit  which  is  the  product  of  such  influ- 
ences. They  live  again  in  every  truth  that  is 
possessed,  in  every  task  that  is  performed,  in 
every  problem  that  is  mastered,  in  every  kindling 


142      VOCATION  OF  THE  SCHOLAR 

flame  of  thought,  in  every  advance  of  knowl- 
edge, in  every  comprehension  of  the  past,  and  in 
every  vision  of  the  future;  they  Hve  again,  not 
only  in  the  more  serious  labors  of  the  scholar, 
but  also  in  the  joy  of  knowledge,  in  the  simple 
pleasures  of  appreciation,  and  in  the  intimate 
comradeship  of  the  scholar's  craft;  for  the  Hfe 
which  they  impart  to  the  things  of  the  mind 
shows  itself  in  the  flower  as  well  as  the  fruit 
of  knowledge. 

The  debt,  therefore,  which  the  scholar  owes  to 
those  who  initiate  the  great  constructive  forces 
in  education  is  something  more  than  a  passing 
sentiment  of  gratitude.  His  is  a  more  serious 
obligation.  He  is  bound  in  honor  to  preserve 
these  forces  in  the  continuity  of  their  develop- 
ment along  lines  of  a  widening  and  deepening 
progress.  And  to  this  end  he  needs  to  remind 
himself  from  time  to  time  of  his  high  vocation 
as  a  scholar.  In  relation  to  the  pioneers  of 
education  and  his  predecessors  in  the  field  of  his 
labors,  he  is  in  a  peculiar  sense  the  trustee  of 
knowledge.  The  sacred  funds  of  truth  are  in 
his  keeping,  and  he  is  responsible  not  only  for 
their  security,  but  also  for  their  transmission 


VOCATION  OF  THE  SCHOLAR       143 

enlarged  and  enriched  to  the  coming  generations. 
Progress  in  knowledge  is  constantly  interrupted, 
because  time  puts  a  limit  upon  all  effort  and 
attainment.  With  years  cometh  wisdom,  also 
cometh  the  end.  Another  generation  must 
begin  the  task  of  knowledge  anew.  And  yet 
such  a  beginning  may  always  be  undertaken 
from  a  point  of  decided  advantage,  provided 
the  teacher  and  scholar  fulfil  their  obligations 
in  any  adequate  manner.  There  is  a  growing 
body  of  truth  which  is  the  possession  of  the  race, 
and  which  is  the  free  heritage  of  every  one  who 
would  walk  in  the  way  of  knowledge.  It  is  the 
inalienable  right  of  all  to  share  this  common 
bounty  of  truth.  To  conserve  this  racial  inheri- 
tance, to  make  it  available  for  the  new  genera- 
tion, to  place  their  feet  in  the  way  of  progress, 
to  put  in  their  hands  the  lamp  of  knowledge, 
to  bid  them  seek  the  truth  and  pursue  it, — this  is 
the  scholar's  vocation. 

There  is,  moreover,  an  additional  obligation 
which  every  scholar  owes  to  his  distinguished 
ancestry.  The  truth  of  yesterday  must  be 
adapted  to  the  needs  of  to-day.  The  scholar's 
function  is  not  merely  to  transmit  knowledge 


144       VOCATION  OF  THE  SCHOLAR 

of  one  generation  to  another;  he  must  be  pre- 
pared also  to  interpret  the  knowledge  which  he 
possesses,  and  the  process  of  interpretation  is 
always  a  transmuting  rather  than  a  merely  trans- 
mitting process.  As  knowledge  is  a  hving  and 
a  growing  thing,  it  must  possess  the  power  of 
new  adaptations.  We  are  disloyal  to  one  who 
utters  a  truth  if  we  seek  to  stereotype  it  in  fixed 
formula  or  final  dogma.  It  is  not  the  sole 
function  of  the  scholar  to  mass  facts  and  illus- 
trate them,  nor  of  the  teacher  to  hear  recitations, 
to  correct  themes,  and  check  the  errors  of  mem- 
ory. Whether  the  scholar  is  writing  a  book  or 
conducting  a  class  exercise,  it  is  his  business 
above  everything  else  to  give  life  to  knowledge. 
This  is  the  chief  office  of  the  interpreter  of  truth. 
It  is  well  also  to  remember  that  the  living  truth 
does  not  always  appear  full  formed.  It,  too,  has 
its  stages  of  growth  which  it  must  pass  through 
in  order  to  come  to  the  complete  revelation  of 
its  nature.  It  is  possible,  therefore,  and  indeed 
it  is  quite  natural  to  expect,  that  in  the  trans- 
mission of  knowledge  the  scholar  through  the 
patient  toil  of  research  and  the  brooding  of 
thought  may  also  contribute  to  the  truth  already 


VOCATION  OF  THE  SCHOLAR       145 

possessed  a  deeper  meaning,  a  wider  applica- 
tion, a  more  vigorous  life. 

In  the  age  in  which  we  now  live  knowledge  is 
changing  with  marvellous  rapidity.  The  schol- 
ar's task,  therefore,  has  never  been  so  interesting, 
never  so  difficult.  The  notable  discoveries  dur- 
ing the  last  decade  alone,  in  physics,  chemistry, 
biology,  bacteriology,  and  other  sciences,  have 
necessitated  a  distinctly  more  profound  if  not 
a  new  interpretation  of  nature.  Not  only  the 
material  content  of  knowledge,  but  its  methods 
also  reflect  the  spirit  of  progress  which  char- 
acterizes the  activities  and  achievements  of  the 
present  age.  The  new  instruments  of  accuracy 
in  research,  the  new  processes  of  discovery  and 
invention,  and  the  more  intimate  knowledge  of 
the  sources  in  every  field  of  inquiry  certainly  en- 
tail an  obligation  for  larger  results  in  scholar- 
ship than  ever  before.  Unless  the  scholar  has 
a  discriminating  appreciation  of  recently  ac- 
quired truth  he  cannot  interpret  aright  the  truth 
of  the  past;  and  if  he  fails  in  this  particular, 
he  is  recreant  to  his  trust  as  the  teacher  and 
lover  of  knowledge.  The  work  of  restoration 
which  the  scholar  must  undertake  in  reference 


146       VOCATION  OF   THE  SCHOLAR 

to  the  treasures  of  the  past  must  be  prosecuted 
with  a  wise  consideration  of  its  relation  to  the 
knowledge  and  the  needs  of  the  present. 

However,  it  should  not  be  forgotten  that 
amidst  much  that  changes  in  the  world  of 
scholarly  research,  there  is  much  also  that  re- 
mains constant.  And  it  is  to  this  constant  ele- 
ment in  truth  that  the  scholar  must  preserve  an 
unswerving  loyalty.  The  popular  philosophy 
of  the  day  repudiates  altogether  the  existence 
of  any  such  constant  element,  and  maintains 
that  all  truth  whatsoever  is  variable,  relative, 
shifting.  Professor  James,  the  most  brilliant 
apostle  of  this  creed  of  change,  insists  that  "we 
must  be  prepared  to  find  false  to-morrow  what 
is  true  to-day,"  This  is  a  statement  which  in  a 
restricted  sense  is  true,  and  which  admits  of  an 
exceedingly  wide  range  of  illustration.  We  are 
constrained  to  confess  that  we  live  throughout 
our  days  under  bondage  to  the  contingent,  and 
that  the  hazard  of  uncertainty  must  be  reckoned 
with  in  all  our  plans  and  undertakings.  And 
yet  while  conceding  all  this,  it  nevertheless  re- 
mains true  that  there  are  certain  ideas  which  in 
the  history  of  the  race  experience  have  become 


VOCATION  OF  THE  SCHOLAR       147 

established  for  all  time,  for  all  places,  and  for  all 
persons  and  things.  These  ideas  rest  upon  a 
secure  foundation.  Amidst  all  that  is  fleeting 
and  variable  in  thought  and  experience,  there 
must  be  some  background  of  truth  which  is  un- 
changing. Otherwise  the  equation  of  hfe  would 
consist  solely  of  variables,  and  would  be  there- 
fore indeterminate  and  wholly  devoid  of  any 
significance  whatsoever.  The  variable  must 
have  the  constant  to  give  it  meaning.  We 
naturally  incline  to  the  belief  that  there  are 
certain  fundamental  ideas  and  sentiments  which 
are  independent  of  time  and  circumstance,  of 
the  changing  opinion  and  fashion  of  the  day. 
Once  true,  they  are  always  true.  They  are  the 
fixed  stars  by  which  we  take  our  reckoning  and 
lay  our  course. 

The  scholar  particularly  dare  not  ignore  that 
consensus  of  thought  which  ages  of  reflection 
and  experience  have  estabhshed.  He  must  have 
some  part  in  the  commerce  of  truth.  How- 
ever original  he  may  be,  he  cannot  wholly  free 
himself  from  the  past.  Among  its  stores  he  is 
bound  to  find  something  fundamental  and  con- 
stitutive, which  is  both  true  to  the  reason  and 


148       VOCATION  OF  THE  SCHOLAR 

law  to  the  will.  I  am  not  in  sympathy  with  the 
declaration  of  Professor  James,  in  his  "Pragma- 
tism," that  we  must  "cultivate  the  attitude  of 
looking  away  from  first  things,  principles,  catego- 
ries, supposed  necessities,  and  of  looking  towards 
last  things,  fruits,  consequences,  facts."  On 
the  contrary  I  believe  most  profoundly  that  the 
most  significant  quest  of  the  scholar  is  the  en- 
deavor to  discover  the  "first  things"  which 
constitute  the  ultimate  ground  of  our  experi- 
ence. The  mind  which  has  not  formed  the 
habit  of  regarding  "first  things"  will  hardly  be 
capable  of  commanding  the  "last  things."  To 
comprehend  the  beginnings,  to  understand  the 
essential  nature  and  ground  of  any  group  of 
phenomena  under  investigation,  as  well  as  the 
implications  which  they  necessitate,  is  indis- 
pensable to  the  clear  appreciation  of  their  worth, 
or  to  the  possibility  of  further  discovery  in  the 
line  of  their  development.  To  discern  the 
truth  that  is  fundamental,  to  appreciate  its 
significance,  to  emphasize  and  proclaim  it,  to 
cause  it  to  prevail  by  making  it  intelligible, — 
this  is  the  scholar's  vocation.  And  in  this 
high  ofl&ce  he  is  the  priest  of  truth.     As  such  he 


VOCATION  OF  THE  SCHOLAR       149 

must  guard  its  sacred  oracles,  maintain  its  tra- 
ditions, follow  the  lead  of  its  light,  and  cherish 
the  spirit  of  devotion  to  its  cause. 

The  scholar  who  is  worthy  the  name  cannot 
be  sceptical  concerning  everything.  He  must 
believe  in  something,  and  believe  it  profoundly 
and  bear  witness  to  its  truth.  Complete  scep- 
ticism is  the  reductio  ad  ahsurdum  of  scholarship. 
Doubt  may  be  the  beginning  of  inquiry;  it  is 
surely  not  the  goal.  To  doubt  is  merely  the 
determination  to  see  deeper  and  understand 
more  clearly.  Doubt  always  marks  a  transition 
stage  in  the  processes  of  investigation.  It  does 
not  produce  satisfaction,  only  restlessness.  In 
its  normal  function  it  points  to  something  be- 
yond itself,  to  a  more  comprehensive  knowl- 
edge, to  a  more  securely  grounded  conviction. 
Doubt  leads  to  the  truth  which  lies  in  the  past 
as  well  as  that  which  beckons  us  from  the  fut- 
ure. To  allow  the  sceptical  attitude  therefore 
to  become  a  permanent  disposition  breeds  a 
cynical  spirit;  and  nothing  is  so  inimical  to  the 
vigor  of  scholarship  as  a  cynical  mood  which 
is  ever  petulantly  asking:  "What  is  truth  .?" 

Our  fathers  believed  in  a  body  of  truth  that 


150      VOCATION  OF  THE  SCHOLAR 

changeth  not  from  generation  to  generation, 
that  is  like  the  word  of  God  which  abideth  for- 
ever. They  would  have  repudiated  with  scorn 
of  indignation  the  modern  pragmatical  doctrine 
that  "the  true  is  only  the  expedient  in  the  way 
of  our  thinking,  just  as  the  right  is  only  the  ex- 
pedient in  the  way  of  our  behaving."  A  false 
theory  of  knowledge  based  upon  a  perverted 
theory  of  ethics  such  as  this  would  never  have 
won  their  allegiance.  They  built  upon  a  more 
stable  foundation.  They  believed  in  the  sover- 
eignty of  reason  and  the  compulsion  of  logical 
implication — that  compulsion  which  recognizes 
uniformity  in  science  and  demands  consistency 
in  morals.  They  beheved  that  man  is  born 
under  an  uncompromising  law  of  righteousness 
which  is  above  expediency  and  the  suggestions 
of  policy  and  convenience.  They  believed  that 
man  is  a  person  and  not  a  thing,  that  he  is  or- 
dained to  progress,  that  he  is  an  end  in  himself 
and  never  merely  a  means  to  some  other  end. 
They  believed  that  the  law  of  mutual  co-opera- 
tion should  prevail  throughout  the  family  of 
human  beings,  and  that  in  the  violation  of  that 
law  the  integrity  of  society  is  permanently  im- 


VOCATION  OF  THE  SCHOLAR       151 

paired.  They  believed  that  all  knowledge  must 
minister  to  righteousness.  They  believed  in 
the  cause  of  honor,  in  the  cause  of  justice,  in 
the  cause  of  freedom,  in  the  cause  of  the  Eternal 
God.  This  creed  is  our  inheritance.  Our 
highest  obligation  as  scholars  is  to  preserve 
inviolate  the  ancestral  continuity  of  conviction 
and  certitude.  The  scholarship  of  the  present 
will  doubtless  carry  us  far  beyond  certain  tradi- 
tions of  the  past.  We  will  leave  much  behind 
that  possesses  only  an  antiquarian  value.  But 
with  all  that  must  be  forgotten  and  with  all  that 
is  new,  we  dare  not  repudiate  those  fundamental 
principles — old-fashioned  they  maybe  but  never 
obsolete — in  which  reason  is  justified,  character 
is  grounded,  and  moral  vigor  is  maintained. 

All  scholarship  must  make  eventually  for  the 
broadening  and  deepening  of  life,  the  life  of  the 
mind  and  the  life  of  the  spirit.  The  results  of 
scholarship  are  not  In  the  interests  of  a  favored 
class,  but  of  humanity  in  general.  The  body 
of  scholars  is  not  a  fraternity  whose  order  Is  to 
be  developed  and  enriched  for  Its  own  sake. 
Within  its  borders  there  are  no  occult  mysteries 
nor  exclusive   privileges.     The   word   which   a 


152       VOCATION  OF  THE  SCHOLAR 

scholar  utters  may  be  understood  in  the  first 
instance  only  by  those  who  speak  the  same  lan- 
guage and  are  conversant  with  the  same  sym- 
bols. And  yet  the  periods  of  the  most  produc- 
tive scholarship  have  usually  called  forth  their 
interpreter,  their  prophet,  some  peculiarly  gifted 
genius  who  possesses  the  faculty  of  making  the 
results  of  scholarship  intelligible  to  the  masses, 
at  least  so  far  as  these  results  have  a  bearing 
upon  the  life  and  character  of  a  people.  The 
old  Greek  philosophy  had  its  Socrates,  Chris- 
tian theology  its  Augustine,  the  Reformation  its 
Luther,  the  philosophy  of  the  French  Revolu- 
tion its  Rousseau,  and  German  philosophy  its 
poet  interpreters  Goethe,  Schiller,  Lessing,  and 
Herder,  and  in  another  land  and  tongue  its 
prophets,  Coleridge  and  Carlyle. 

Every  scholar  cannot  be  a  prophet  to  the 
world,  but  he  can  contribute  something  to  the 
message  which  one  day  the  chosen  prophet  will 
bring  in  the  name  of  scholarship  to  the  heart 
and  mind  of  a  people.  The  individual  may 
always  remain  a  toiler  in  secret.  The  service 
that  is  indirect,  however,  is  none  the  less  im- 
portant although  it  may  be  less  conspicuous. 


VOCATION  OF  THE  SCHOLAR       153 

A  single  thought  is  often  born  of  many  minds. 
In  the  progress  of  the  truth,  the  individual 
scholar  here  and  there  who  has  contributed  to 
it  may  be  forgotten,  and  he  may  never  enjoy  the 
recognition  and  the  praise  w^hich  is  his  due. 
Nevertheless  he  has  a  deep  satisfaction  in  the 
consciousness  that  the  results  of  his  labors 
though  lost  to  sight  have  become  in  a  small 
measure  at  least  a  part  of  the  thought  of  the 
w^orld. 

Upon  the  stone  which  marks  the  grave  of 
Fichte  by  the  Oranienburg  gate  in  Bedin,  there 
is  this  inscription,  which  adequately  expresses 
the  scholar's  vocation  and  the  scholar's  reward: 
"The  teachers  shall  shine  as  the  brightness  of 
the  firmament,  and  they  that  turn  many  to 
righteousness  as  the  stars  that  shine  forever  and 
ever.'* 


X 

THE  SUPERFLUOUS  IN  EDUCATION 

**  I  ^O-DAY  our  schools  and  colleges  are  under 
fire  of  criticism  from  many  quarters;  and 
the  burden  of  the  indictment  against  present- 
day  methods  in  education  seems  to  be  that  many 
if  not  most  of  the  subjects  which  are  taught  are 
superfluous.  In  reference  to  this  charge,  how- 
ever, I  am  inclined  to  apply  Voltaire's  whimsical 
paradox  —  Le  superfiii,  chose  trees  necessaire. 
The  zeal  to  eradicate  the  superfluous  may  pluck 
by  the  roots  many  a  plant  of  whose  flower  and 
fruit  we  may  not  be  deprived  without  incalcula- 
ble loss.  What  standard  is  available,  according 
to  which  one  can  discriminate  between  that 
which  is  superfluous  and  that  which  is  not  ^ 
The  answer  to  this  question  is  not  far  to  seek; 
for  it  is  heard  above  the  many  voices  of  our  age 
with  insistent  reiteration — "whatever  does  not 
contribute  directly  to  efficiency  in  life,  that  is 
superfluous."  This  is  the  voice  of  pragmatism 
in  philosophy,  of  utilitarianism  in  morals;  in 
154 


SUPERFLUOUS  IN   EDUCATION       155 

political  circles  this  same  idea  is  expressed  in  the 
creed  of  "practical  politics";  in  the  world  of 
industrial  enterprise  it  lurks  in  the  phrase, 
"business  is  business,"  whose  tautology  is  a 
flimsy  disguise  of  irresponsible  practices;  in 
religion  even  a  similar  disposition  is  shown  in 
the  desire  to  convert  the  church  into  a  working 
club  instead  of  a  house  of  worship. 

With  many  this  idea  of  efficiency,  as  the  end 
of  all  education  and  the  standard  of  all  values, 
is  still  further  particularized  by  limiting  effi- 
ciency to  the  sphere  of  one's  professional  or 
business  activities.  To  make  a  man  efficient  in 
his  special  calling, — that,  it  is  insisted,  should  be 
the  sole  task  of  education.  And  consequently 
there  is  a  general  marking  down  of  all  values 
to  that  level.  This  tendency  is  seen  in  the  em- 
phasis which  some  of  our  educational  institu- 
tions are  placing  upon  technical  and  profes- 
sional courses  which  even  in  the  undergraduate 
years  are  pursued  to  the  exclusion  of  all  the 
more  humanistic  interests.  Fit  the  boy  for  the 
special  work  he  has  to  do.  Let  everything  be 
sacrificed  to  that  end.  Here,  it  is  alleged,  is  a 
principle  which  will  enable  one  to  devise  not 


156      SUPERFLUOUS  IN  EDUCATION 

only  a  satisfactory  curriculum  but  also  a  pro- 
gramme of  life.  If  the  young  man,  is  expecting 
to  be  a  doctor,  let  him  confine  his  attention 
solely  to  the  studies  which  will  contribute  valu- 
able material  to  the  store  of  knowledge  needed 
in  this  profession — such  as  the  general  knowl- 
edge of  plant  and  animal  life,  of  human  anat- 
omy and  physiology,  of  chemistry  and  kindred 
subjects.  Let  him  begin  to  narrow  into  pro- 
fessional grooves  before  his  entrance  into  the 
professional  school.  He  will  thus  save  time, 
and  prevent  an  enormous  waste  of  energy. 
When  we  come,  however,  to  examine  this  posi- 
tion more  particularly,  even  upon  the  footing 
of  efficiency,  it  is  evident  that  the  adherents  of 
such  a  theory  are  in  grave  danger  of  defeating 
their  own  purposes.  The  man  most  efficient  in 
his  business  or  profession  is  the  one  who  pos- 
sesses some  reserve  power  over  and  above 
that  which  he  may  ever  be  called  upon  to  ex- 
pend upon  the  actual  labors  of  his  specialty. 
A  man  always  needs  more  than  he  uses.  He 
who  can  do  but  one  thing,  never  does  it  su- 
premely well.  An  excess  of  power  is  an  essen- 
tial and  significant  factor  in  efficiency. 


SUPERFLUOUS  IN  EDUCATION       157 

In  determining  the  strength  of  materials,  the 
mechanical  engineer  never  thinks  of  attempting 
to  calculate  stress  and  strain  forces  so  precisely 
as  to  adjust  a  given  beam  or  girder  to  the  exact 
load  it  is  required  to  bear.  On  the  contrary  he 
recognizes  the  necessity  of  allowing  for  a  sub- 
stantial factor  of  safety,  so  that  the  strength  of 
the  material  will  exceed  the  limit  of  any  possible 
exigency.  It  is  the  surplus  strength  that  makes 
all  construction  solid  and  secure.  In  a  similar 
manner  a  man's  strength  must  exceed  the  exac- 
tions of  his  tasks  by  a  reassuring  margin  of 
efficiency;  otherwise  his  work  is  but  poorly  done. 
Every  man  of  force  should  possess  some  power 
in  his  nature  which  can  be  felt  even  when  it  is 
not  actually  operative;  and  when  it  is  operative, 
it  should  give  the  impression  that  its  resources 
are  inexhaustible. 

It  is  in  the  reserve  power  which  we  insensibly 
discern  back  of  a  man's  personality  that  our 
confidence  in  the  lawyer,  the  doctor, the  minister, 
or  the  engineer  is  grounded.  The  difference 
between  the  ordinary  and  the  extraordinary 
man  in  professional  or  business  life,  Hes  in  just 
this  surplus  of  power  which  in  the  daily  routine 


158      SUPERFLUOUS  IN  EDUCATION 

of  life  is  never  required.  When  one  possesses 
such  a  power,  his  efficiency  is  increased  in  a 
marvellous  degree;  for  he  brings  to  his  work 
a  mind  larger  than  his  tasks,  and  a  nature 
stronger  than  the  pressure  which  it  must  sus- 
tain. On  the  other  hand  that  man  is  doomed 
to  mediocrity  who  has  in  his  possession  no  super- 
fluous knowledge  beyond  the  ordinary  demands 
of  his  craft,  and  who  finds  himself  a  stranger  in 
any  company  beyond  the  bounds  of  his  own 
guild. 

Therefore  if  in  the  studies  which  we  select  as 
the  best  preparation  of  a  young  man  for  his  fut- 
ure work  in  life,  we  have  constantly  in  mind  only 
their  direct  bearing  upon  the  special  field  of  his 
activity  in  later  years,  then  we  are  doing  that 
young  man  a  very  serious  and  distinct  injury. 
If  the  range  of  his  knowledge  is  merely  coexten- 
sive with  the  programme  of  his  prospective  duties 
in  the  limited  field  of  his  profession,  we  may  ex- 
pect from  him  only  very  meagre  attainment. 
Liberal  knowledge  means  precisely  this,  that  it 
serves  to  emancipate  a  man  from  the  bondage 
of  his  specialty.  He  is  at  home  in  other  fields, 
and  when  from  his  various  excursions  into  their 


SUPERFLUOUS  IN  EDUCATION       159 

regions  he  returns  to  his  own  work,  he  moves  in 
the  sphere  of  his  labors  more  boldly  and  there- 
fore more  efficiently  because  he  need  not  live 
always  under  the  limitations  of  its  boundaries. 
Our  college  courses  should  not  attempt  to  pre- 
pare a  man  primarily  for  any  particular  set  of 
tasks,  but  for  a  far  more  significant  and  myste- 
rious event, — the  coming  into  possession  of  a 
mind.  A  man's  mind  is  the  instrument  of  his 
productive  power.  The  measure  of  his  future 
efficiency  is  his  mental  capability.  Therefore 
it  should  be  the  end  of  all  education  to  develop 
every  possibility  of  the  growing  mind  to  the 
full  extent  of  its  capacity  and  strength.  Every 
stream  of  knowledge  which  has  its  source  in 
the  hidden  springs  of  the  mind  sooner  or  later 
finds  its  way  into  the  central  current  of  life, 
adding  velocity  and  volume  to  its  flow.  The 
very  thing  which  may  be  regarded  as  superflu- 
ous often  proves  a  revelation  of  concealed  pos- 
sibility and  of  potential  power.  The  college 
course  is  a  period  when  the  student  and  teacher 
together  should  be  engaged  in  prospecting  ad- 
ventures for  the  very  purpose  of  discovering  the 
veins  worthy  to  mine.     Certainly  nothing  can 


i6o       SUPERFLUOUS  IN  EDUCATION 

be  deemed  superfluous  where  everything  is  pos- 
sible. 

It  is  the  glory  of  the  industrial  world  in  the 
last  generation  that  its  inventive  minds  have 
solved  the  problem  of  its  waste  material.  They 
have  acquired  the  art  of  transforming  the  super- 
fluous into  valuable  products.  The  residual 
phenomena  have  disclosed  sources  of  unim- 
agined  possibilities  which  have  made  for  the 
comfort,  convenience,  and  efficiency  of  our 
modern  life.  In  the  acquisition  of  knowledge 
likewise,  the  by-products  are  not  to  be  despised 
nor  lightly  overlooked.  In  them  there  may  lurk 
the  germs  of  power  which  in  the  years  of  an 
active  life  may  pass  through  many  transforma- 
tions, appearing  now  and  again  in  a  force  whose 
source  is  unrecognizable,  but  which  neverthe- 
less may  give  to  the  mental  energies  of  the  man 
an  added  momentum  and  impact. 

It  is  well,  therefore,  in  the  early  years  of 
training  to  strive  to  develop  as  many  and  as 
diverse  interests  as  possible.  It  is  the  period 
of  discovery  as  well  as  of  drudgery  and  routine. 
That  mind  is  richly  furnished  which  has  estab- 
lished for  itself  a  widely  ramifying  net-work  of 


SUPERFLUOUS  IN  EDUCATION      i6i 

associations.  The  more  complex  this  mesh  of 
associated  material,  the  greater  is  the  possibility 
of  suggestion,  leading  to  new  points  of  view,  to 
invention,  or  to  discovery;  the  greater  also  the 
possibility  of  forming  the  habits  of  critical  and 
mature  judgment.  Professor  Ernst  Mach  of  the 
university  of  Vienna,  in  an  essay  entitled  "Acci- 
dent in  Invention  and  Discovery,'*  draws  atten- 
tion to  many  interesting  cases  wherein  accident 
has  been  a  conspicuous  factor  in  the  field  of 
scientific  research.  It  is  very  significant,  how- 
ever, that  in  every  instance  which  he  mentions 
and  in  every  instance  which  suggests  itself  to 
memory,  is  one  in  which  the  chance  suggestion 
occurs  to  a  mind  already  possessing  a  wealth 
of  profound  and  varied  knowledge. 

Judged,  therefore,  even  from  the  point  of  view 
of  eflRciency  alone,  the  superfluous  plays  a  part 
in  our  training  of  which  we  are  never  fully  con- 
scious and  which  we  never  adequately  appreciate. 
Nevertheless  this  by  no  means  exhausts  the  sum 
total  of  its  good  offices.  It  serves  to  minister 
also  to  the  making  of  that  margin  of  the  man 
which  has  a  value  over  and  above  his  profes- 
sional   activities    and    attainments.     To    some 


i62      SUPERFLUOUS  IN  EDUCATION 

practical  minds  it  seems  wholly  unnecessary 
that  any  man  should  be  more  than  a  good  work- 
ing machine.  However,  the  plus  element,  which 
may  be  superfluous  as  regards  the  mere  machine 
idea  of  human  activity,  nevertheless  marks  the 
essential  quality  of  man  as  man. 

This  human  being  so  variously  endowed, 
with  his  wide  range  of  interests  and  sympathies, 
sustaining  manifold  relations  with  the  great 
world  about  him,  rejoicing  in  his  varied  pleasures 
and  pursuits,  this  centre  from  which  so  many 
lines  of  actual  and  of  potential  power  radiate, 
surely  this  creature  is  something  more  than  a 
machine  for  producing  briefs  and  prescriptions, 
contracts  and  inventories,  investments,  balance- 
sheets,  and  tariff"  bills.  The  man  must  be  big- 
ger than  his  business  or  his  profession.  He  is 
not  only  a  lawyer,  a  doctor,  a  legislator,  but 
he  is  a  citizen,  a  companion,  husband,  father, 
friend.  He  has  innumerable  points  of  contact 
with  his  fellows.  The  responsibilities  of  life 
press  upon  him  from  all  sides.  If  there  is  no 
surplus  of  mind  and  heart  to  meet  them,  the 
man  is  poor  indeed.  It  is  the  overflow  of  a  large 
nature,  the  superfluous  if  you  wish  so  to  charac- 


SUPERFLUOUS  IN  EDUCATION       163 

terize  it,  which  lends  tone  and  color  to  a  man's 
life,  which  gives  him  a  place  in  his  community, 
and  which  makes  him  a  significant  part  of  his 
day  and  generation.  Back  of  his  spoken  word, 
back  of  his  deed,  back  of  his  silent  presence  in 
the  company  of  his  own  kind  there  is  an  im- 
mediate recognition  of  the  warmth  and  wealth 
of  his  personality.  It  is  the  superfluous  that 
marks  the  difference  between  justice  and  gen- 
erosity, between  bare  decency  and  magnanim- 
ity, between  the  full  measure  and  the  over- 
flowing. It  is  the  superfluous  quahty  of  a  man's 
nature  which  provokes  love,  and  not  merely 
admiration  and  respect. 

Asking  one  of  my  colleagues  recently  concern- 
ing his  estimate  of  a  certain  eminent  scholar, 
he  replied:  "He  is  a  great  scholar  but  a  small 
man.'*  Now  there  is  certainly  very  little  satis- 
faction in  the  consciousness  that  one  is  ranked 
as  a  brilliant  lawyer  or  a  skilful  surgeon,  if  at 
the  same  time  he  has  the  common  reputation  of 
being  a  miserable  specimen  of  a  man.  At  the 
last  count  a  man  is  judged  according  to  the  ex- 
tent and  depth  of  the  vein  of  humanity  which 
may  be  discernible  in  his  nature.     By  that  test 


1 64       SUPERFLUOUS  IN  EDUCATION 

he  stands  or  falls.  The  moment  a  hollow  ring 
is  detected  in  his  word  or  deed,  that  man  is  lost. 
No  amount  of  skill  or  proficiency  can  compen- 
sate for  the  want  of  that  solid  basis  of  manliness 
which  from  the  strictly  practical  view  of  utility 
may  be  regarded  by  many  as  altogether  super- 
fluous. 

There  is  a  certain  type  of  provincialism  which 
is  temporal  rather  than  spatial,  which  holds  a 
man  fast  within  the  boundaries  of  his  own  age. 
No  one  is  truly  cosmopolitan  who  knows  noth- 
ing of  the  world  beyond  the  confines  of  his  own 
generation.  To  live  the  life  of  to-day  in  its 
fulness  one  must  know  the  life  of  yesterday. 
To  be  a  citizen  of  the  world,  one  must  have  some 
appreciation  of  the  world's  thought,  its  efforts 
and  achievements,  its  faith  and  its  hope  in  the 
ages  which  are  past.  To  one  who  does  not  find 
himself  a  stranger  in  a  distant  century  there 
comes  an  expansion  of  mind  and  of  sympathies 
which  enables  him  to  bring  to  his  own  day  and 
to  his  own  life  the  deep  satisfactions  of  super- 
fluous knowledge  and  power.  The  foundations 
for  this  interest  in  the  far-off"  lands  of  time  must 
be  laid  during  the  college  years.     And  it  should 


SUPERFLUOUS  IN  EDUCATION      165 

be  regarded  as  an  essential  function  of  this 
man-making  enterprise  to  which  our  colleges  are 
pledged,  to  stimulate  and  foster  such  an  interest 
by  every  conceivable  means. 

The  philistine  is  usually  efficient.  There  is 
no  charge  against  him  on  that  score.  Indeed 
it  is  just  because  he  is  so  practically  efficient 
and  nothing  more  that  he  is  the  philistine.  His 
values  are  all  standardized.  He  has  no  appre- 
ciations, only  appraisals  and  inventories.  He 
is  in  the  world  but  not  of  it,  because  his  tastes 
and  interests  command  so  small  a  corner  of  it. 
Several  years  ago,  while  spending  a  few  weeks 
in  Rome,  I  chanced  to  meet  one  of  these  hope- 
less individuals  who  was  completely  stript  of  all 
superfluous  interests  and  knowledge.  He  had 
possessed  the  native  wit  sufficient  to  accumu- 
late a  large  fortune.  As  regards  the  treasures 
of  Rome,  however,  he  was  the  veriest  pauper. 
He  did  not  know  enough  to  conceal  his  igno- 
rance. Seated  opposite  to  me  at  dinner  one 
evening,  I  overheard  him  asking  his  neighbor,  a 
young  Scotchwoman  who  was  a  student  of  arch- 
aeology in  Rome:  "What  is  there  worth  seeing 
in  the  Palace  of  the  Caesars  ?    There  is  nothing 


i66       SUPERFLUOUS  IN  EDUCATION 

there  but  ruins,  is  there  ?"  The  reply  was  elo- 
quent in  its  simplicity,  and  penetrating  in  its 
complete  understanding  of  the  man.  "No,*'  she 
said,  ** nothing  but  ruins."  Her  questioner  was 
beyond  both  instruction  and  rebuke.  In  his 
nature  there  was  nothing  superfluous,  and  con- 
sequently everything  that  was  not  reflected  in 
his  shallow  and  limited  capacity  was  regarded 
by  him  as  itself  superfluous.  For  him  the  ruins 
of  Rome  could  better  be  replaced  by  modern 
office  buildings,  and  its  forum  become  indeed 
an  actual  market-place.  To  a  limited  nature 
most  things  will  naturally  seem  superfluous,  just 
as  to  a  great  nature  nothing  is  superfluous. 

The  crucial  tests  of  life  usually  prove  the  man 
rather  than  his  professional  ability  and  skill. 
The  emergencies  which  call  for  instant  decision 
and  prompt  action  tap  the  hidden  sources  which 
never  can  be  discerned  by  surface  observation. 
What  the  world  may  never  have  discovered, 
what  the  man  himself  may  have  been  wholly 
unconscious  of  possessing, — far-off"  dreams  and 
fancies,  records  of  forgotten  interests  and  studies 
indelibly  stamped  upon  his  nature,  experiences 
which  in  their  time  may  have  served  to  discip- 


SUPERFLUOUS  IN   EDUCATION       167 

line  the  mind  and  temper  the  spirit, — these  su- 
perfluous elements  of  his  being  burst  into  power, 
and  become  efficient  to  heal,  to  strengthen  and 
to  save. 

It  is  the  superfluous  which  forms  the  unseen 
foundations  of  character  and  unconsciously 
fortifies  our  will  and  purposes.  It  is  the  super- 
fluous also  which  gives  zest  to  simple  pleasures, 
which  makes  a  tramp  through  the  woods  a 
delight  and  not  a  bore,  which  provides  an  avo- 
cation for  us  as  well  as  a  vocation,  so  that  when 
the  office  or  work-room  is  closed  the  doors  of 
the  world  swing  open  to  us.  It  is  the  superflu- 
ous which  puts  a  book  into  our  hand  and  crowds 
the  mind  with  new  thoughts  and  quickens  the 
heart  with  a  fresh  impulse. 

Without  something  superfluous,  nothing  is 
complete.  The  teacher  must  possess  superflu- 
ous knowledge,  a  superfluous  interest  also  in  the 
young  life  about  him;  the  man  of  aff'airs  must 
possess  superfluous  power;  our  companions,  su- 
perfluous wit  and  good-humor;  our  friends,  su- 
perfluous aff"ection  and  sympathy;  and  he  who 
would  advance  the  world's  progress,  superfluous 
enthusiasm  and  hope. 


XI 

SECONDARY    STRAINS 

TN  the  late  afternoon  of  August  29,  1907,  the 
great  cantilever  bridge  across  the  St.  Law- 
rence River  at  Quebec  gave  way  of  its  own  weight, 
and  some  seventy  workmen  engaged  upon  this 
massive  structure  were  carried  down  to  death 
amidst  a  tangled  mass  of  twisted  rods  and  beams. 
The  bridge  was  carrying  at  the  time  no  unusual 
load;  indeed  it  was  carrying  no  load  whatsoever 
save  the  weight  of  its  own  structure;  for  it  was 
still  in  the  process  of  building,  and  even  before 
it  could  be  put  to  any  actual  test  of  its  calcu- 
lated strength  it  collapsed  and  crashed  into  the 
river  beneath. 

The  whistle  of  the  construction  company  had 
just  sounded  the  end  of  the  day's  work,  the  last 
day's  work  for  the  bridge  builders  save  the  four 
or  five  who  alone  were  rescued  from  the  falling 
mass.  This  tragedy  of  engineering  skill  and  of 
constructive  enterprise,  this  tragedy  also  of 
168 


SECONDARY  STRAINS  169 

human  life  completely  bewildered  the  scientific 
world.  There  is  a  mystery  about  an  event 
which  in  the  light  of  mechanical  theory  is  im- 
possible. This  structure  according  to  the  cal- 
culation of  the  most  expert  and  skilful  engineers 
was  capable  of  supporting  over  twice  the  load 
it  was  carrying  at  the  time  of  its  fall.  Subse- 
quently the  most  painstaking  investigation  of 
the  wreckage  disclosed  the  fact  that  no  defec- 
tive material  had  been  used  in  the  construc- 
tion; moreover,  no  dynamic  shock  nor  unusual 
wind  pressure  had  occurred  in  connection  with 
the  disaster.  What,  then,  was  the  structural 
weakness  which  caused  this  bridge  to  fall  un- 
der its  own  weight  ?  Was  there  some  colossal 
blunder  in  the  strain  calculations  ?  Was  there 
some  egregious  error  in  the  plans  of  construc- 
tion ?  Was  it  the  carelessness  of  foreman  or 
workmen  ? 

For  some  time  no  one  could  give  a  satisfactory 
answer,  although  many  were  essayed.  Finally, 
however,  when  the  official  report  of  the  engineer- 
ing experts  was  made  public,  the  mystery  was 
cleared.  It  seems  that  the  beginnings  of  this 
stupendous  collapse  were  traced  to  one  of  the 


170  SECONDARY  STRAINS 

great  bottom  chords  of  the  bridge,  designed  to 
support  the  main  structure  resting  upon  it. 
This  chord  was  a  latticed  beam  fifty-seven  feet 
in  length,  composed  of  four  ribs  or  webs  braced 
together.  The  bridge  fell  because  there  was  a 
buckling  of  this  supporting  beam.  And  this 
buckling  of  the  beam  occurred  because  its  sev- 
eral parts  were  not  sufficiently  braced  together 
so  as  to  enable  them  to  act  as  a  whole.  Instead 
of  forming  a  single  compact  piece,  they  were 
merely  so  many  separate  pieces,  and  therefore 
incapable  of  offering  adequate  resisting  power. 
No  part  was  at  all  defective;  each  was  equal  to 
the  load  it  was  calculated  to  bear,  with  a  con- 
siderable factor  of  safety  provided  for.  Strong 
in  themselves,  their  combined  strength  was 
wanting  merely  because  the  parts  did  not  hold 
tightly  together. 

What  are  known  as  the  secondary  strains,  to 
which  a  structure  such  as  this  bridge  is  exposed, 
had  so  loosened  the  several  parts  of  this  im- 
mense central  chord  that  it  gave  way  under  the 
pressure  of  the  primary  strains — that  is,  those 
strains  due  to  the  actual  load  which  a  structure 
must  support. 


SECONDARY  STRAINS  171 

It  seems  that  in  the  work  upon  the  Quebec 
bridge  rivets  had  been  used  which  were  slightly 
small  for  the  eyes  which  they  were  supposed  to 
fill  completely  and  tightly;  consequently  the 
parts  were  not  held  compactly  together,  and  so 
the  ordinary  vibrations  and  changes  in  the 
pressure  tension  of  this  huge  structure  would 
tend  naturally  to  loosen  them  more  and  more. 
With  the  loosening  of  the  parts  the  long  beam 
would  necessarily  begin  to  sag  somewhat;  and 
for  every  fraction  of  an  inch  which  such  a  sup- 
porting member  bends  out  of  the  straight  line 
there  is  a  rapidly  increasing  ratio  of  weakness 
until  finally  the  elastic  limit  is  reached  and  the 
crash  comes.  The  secondary  strains  cannot 
break  but  they  can  loosen  and  bend;  they  thus 
weaken  a  structure  so  that  it  is  no  longer  ca- 
pable of  resisting  the  primary  strains. 

It  is  perhaps  not  too  forced  an  appHcation  to 
discover  in  this  disaster  certain  suggestions  as 
to  the  significance  of  the  secondary  strains  of 
life  in  their  bearing  upon  character  and  conduct. 
From  time  immemorial,  human  activity  has 
been  regarded  as  a  process  of  building.  Each 
individual  erects  some  kind  of  a  structure  into 


172  SECONDARY  STRAINS 

which  he  builds  his  deeds,  his  thoughts,  and  his 
purposes.  Like  a  bridge  his  Hfe  must  carry  its 
load.  Other  Hves  must  pass  and  repass  upon  it. 
There  are  many  who  come  to  depend  impHcitly 
upon  its  stabihty  and  to  feel  an  instinctive  secu- 
rity in  its  power  to  resist  the  daily  tests  of  stress 
and  strain.  While  it  stands,  the  commerce  of 
man  is  promoted,  and  life  is  safeguarded  from 
peril  of  accident  and  calamity.  But  if  it  falls, 
others  go  down  with  it  into  the  flood. 

The  human  disaster,  when  the  collapse  comes, 
causes  the  same  kind  of  bewilderment  as  that 
which  was  occasioned  by  the  fall  of  the  Quebec 
bridge.  It  is  the  fall  of  the  strong  man  that  is 
so  difficult  to  understand.  Of  the  weak  man 
we  naturally  expect  disaster;  and  there  is  no 
shock  of  surprise  when  it  comes.  But  when  the 
strong  man  sinks  under  his  load,  then  all  of  our 
calculations  seem  to  have  wofully  miscarried. 
We  look  at  the  wreckage  in  amazement  and  ex- 
claim: "How  is  it  possible  that  such  weakness 
should  come  out  of  such  strength.'*"  Here  is 
one  whose  life  has  been  a  long  discipline  of  en- 
durance. He  has  accustomed  himself  to  carry 
heavier  and  heavier  burdens  as  the  years  have 


SECONDARY  STRAINS  173 

gone  on,  and  to  resist  greater  and  greater  press- 
ure. His  powers  of  perseverance  and  resource 
have  been  taxed  to  the  uttermost  and  have  never 
failed.  His  name  in  the  community  is  synony- 
mous with  stabiHty  and  integrity.  Of  a  sudden, 
however,  this  structure  gives  way  of  its  own 
weight,  and  crashes  into  the  depths  which  mark 
and  yet  hide  its  shame. 

What  is  the  reason  ?  The  answer  to  this 
question  may  be  suggested  by  the  Quebec 
bridge.  May  it  not  be  possible  that  this  man 
has  been  capable  of  resisting  the  primary  strains 
of  life,  but  not  the  secondary  ?  His  life  has 
been  strong  to  bear  its  load,  even  to  endure  the 
storm  pressure  which  it  has  been  called  upon  to 
meet  from  time  to  time,  but  possibly  it  has  not 
been  able  to  withstand  the  shaking  and  loosen- 
ing of  its  parts,  the  friction  of  their  wearing  one 
upon  the  other  day  after  day,  the  consequent 
sagging  of  the  whole  and  the  final  point  of 
breaking. 

Character  is  composite.  Its  supporting  mem- 
bers which  are  variously  related  must  be  com- 
pactly braced  together.  A  very  insignificant 
element  may  serve  to  hold  more  important  parts 


174  SECONDARY  STRAINS 

in  place.  Of  what  avail  the  strong  massive 
plates  if  there  is  a  shearing  off  of  the  rivets 
which  bind  them  together  ?  The  first  traces 
of  inconsistency,  the  breaking  down  of  princi- 
ple in  small  and  seemingly  immaterial  particu- 
lars, some  policy  of  indirection,  some  concealed 
methods,  some  disingenuous  explanation,  these 
symptoms,  slight  in  importance  though  they 
may  seem  to  be,  nevertheless  mark  the  begin- 
nings of  possible  disaster.  The  man's  char- 
acter is  no  longer  whole.  And  this  is  precisely 
equivalent  to  saying  that  he  is  no  longer  a  man 
of  integrity.  The  loosening  of  the  elements  of 
character,  the  elements  of  honor,  of  honesty,  of 
self-respect,  of  self-reverence,  throw  the  man's 
whole  nature  out  of  the  straight  line.  With  this 
sagging  of  character  both  its  supporting  and 
resisting  power  are  immeasurably  lessened;  and 
one  day  it  gives  way  under  the  pressure  of  a 
load  no  greater  than  those  we  have  been  accus- 
tomed to  see  it  bear  year  after  year. 

Then  we  ask  how  it  is  possible  that  a  man 
with  such  tested  character  should  come  to  dis- 
appoint every  expectation  and  promise  of  his 
nature.     According    to    our    calculations    this 


SECONDARY  STRAINS  175 

programme  of  disaster  was  impossible.  In  our 
reckonings,  however,  we  never  for  a  moment 
suspected,  possibly  the  man  himself  never  sus- 
pected, the  steady  pressure  of  the  secondary 
strains  in  his  life.  The  world  sees  only  the 
disaster;  it  does  not  see  how  the  man  himself 
by  slow  but  sure  processes  of  deterioration  day 
after  day  has  been  preparing  for  it. 

The  very  consciousness  that  one  has  overcome 
successfully,  perhaps  easily,  the  primary  strains 
of  life  may  in  itself  tend  to  put  a  man  off  guard 
as  regards  the  secondary  strains  to  which  his 
nature  is  exposed.  He  ignores  them;  they  may 
pass  unnoticed  until  seen  by  their  effects  upon 
him,  and  these  effects  may  have  created  already 
centres  of  weakness  which  it  is  too  late  to  re- 
inforce. Some  supporting  chord  may  have 
reached  its  elastic  limit,  and  the  breaking-point 
is  inevitable. 

How  often  this  happens.  We  observe  it 
again  and  again.  A  young  man  proves  himself 
strong  to  resist  the  temptations  of  his  early 
youth.  He  passes  through  them  all  unscathed, 
he  shows  himself  diligent,  self-restrained,  obedi- 
ent.    He  keeps  his  head  cool  and  his  feet  on  the 


176  SECONDARY  STRAINS 

ground.  Later  he  comes  to  the  years  of  strug- 
gle, when  all  efforts  are  bent  upon  establishing 
himself  securely  in  the  business  or  professional 
world.  He  is  not  afraid  of  work.  He  eagerly 
seeks  it,  and  seeks,  too,  the  hours  of  extra  ser- 
vice. He  toils  early  and  late.  He  is  industrious, 
thrifty,  capable.  His  courage  and  enthusiasm 
are  never  for  a  moment  abated.  The  burdens 
which  he  bears  only  serve  tc  increase  his  strength 
and  develop  his  powers.  His  career  is  one  of 
steady  progress.  The  primary  strains  of  life 
he  has  withstood  conspicuously  and  nobly. 

He  now  meets  the  temptations  of  middle-age, 
subtle,  strong,  and  undermining — temptations 
which  for  their  testing  and  searching  power  are 
incomparably  more  formidable  than  any  of  the 
trials  of  youth.  The  secondary  strains  begin 
to  operate.  They  are  with  him  the  strains  of 
success.  For  with  success  comes  leisure,  added 
sources  of  power,  the  means  of  gratifying  every 
chance  desire,  and  the  call  of  ambition.  The 
simple  setting  of  his  life  has  been  replaced  by 
an  increasing  complexity  of  interests  and  activ- 
ities. The  old  delights  begin  to  pall,  and  he 
craves  the   stimulation  of  more  highly  spiced 


SECONDARY  STRAINS  177 

pleasures.  The  intoxication  of  success  may  in- 
duce a  recklessness  of  enterprise  which  puts  in 
jeopardy  the  fortunes  of  himself  and  of  others. 
Their  happiness,  and  possibly  their  lives,  is  in 
his  keeping.  The  individual  temperament  will 
in  most  cases  determine  the  direction  and  extent 
of  the  lines  of  strain.  Whatever  the  weak  point 
of  his  nature  may  be,  it  is  bound  to  feel  the 
pressure  due  to  the  extra  burden  of  weight  which 
success  always  entails.  In  the  calculations  of 
strains  for  a  bridge  or  building,  a  storm  factor 
is  reckoned  with  in  order  to  provide  for  the  ex- 
ceptional pressure  of  high  winds  or  even  of  a 
hurricane  upon  the  structure.  For  man,  how- 
ever, it  would  be  far  more  important  and  to  the 
point,  to  compute  a  prosperity  factor,  and  allow 
it,  moreover,  to  fall  well  within  a  wide  margin 
of  safety. 

The  strains  of  struggle  seem  often  to  steady 
a  man;  the  pressure,  however,  of  success  proves 
too  strong  for  him  to  withstand.  In  the  fight 
he  is  noble,  but  in  the  victory  ignoble.  Caesar 
once  said  this  of  Pompey:  that  he  knew  how  to 
win  a  victory  but  he  did  not  know  how  to  use 
it.     This  is  in  a  measure  illustrated  also  by  our 


178  SECONDARY  STRAINS 

late  civil  war.  As  a  people  we  withstood  the 
shock  of  battle  and  the  strain  of  the  long  years 
of  national  trial.  The  secondary  strains  came 
with  the  tests  of  reconstruction.  These  strains, 
unhappily,  were  not  so  nobly  resisted.  They 
created  a  loosening  and  separating'of  the  strong 
elements  of  our  national  character  to  such  an 
extent  that  when  we  turn  our  thoughts  to  this 
period  of  our  history,  it  provokes  just  condem- 
nation and  shame.  And  in  the  progress  of  our 
national  life  during  the  last  generation  also,  we 
have  been  strong  enough  and  wise  enough  to  re- 
sist the  primary  strains.  It  is  in  the  secondary 
strains  that  our  dangers  obviously  lie.  There 
are  many  forces  now  at  work  which  are  un- 
settling and  disorganizing,  and  which  tend 
to  unfit  us  for  the  supreme  test  when  it 
comes. 

The  testing  strains,  however,  are  by  no  means 
confined  to  the  years  or  to  the  experiences  of 
success.  There  are  many  who  have  never 
known  success  in  any  full  or  overflowing  meas- 
ure, whose  natures,  nevertheless,  are  under  the 
constant  pressure  of  certain  secondary  strains 
quite  as  serious  and  quite  as  menacing.     There 


SECONDARY  STRAINS  179 

is  a  man  who  has  passed  that  period  of  his  Ufa 
when  all  things  seem  possible,  when  hope  runs 
high  and  the  dreams  of  the  future  bring  joy  and 
the  eager  haste  to  realize  their  alluring  proph- 
ecies. For  this  man,  life  has  become  a  routine 
and  a  discipline.  Opportunities  have  come  and 
gone;  the  actual  in  all  its  grim  reality  has  re- 
placed the  possible.  His  habits  have  set  into 
hard  and  fast  lines.  He  no  longer  looks  for  the 
surprise  of  the  unexpected  or  for  the  glorious 
chance  of  an  untried  career.  The  unknown 
has  now  no  charm  of  mystery  about  it — only 
dread  and  fear.  Courage  begins  to  falter,  the 
spirit  loses  its  spring,  and  hope  dies.  Human 
strength,  hke  steel  supports  under  constant 
tension,  without  change  and  without  rest,  loses 
its  elasticity  and  consequently  its  live  power  of 
resistance. 

When  one  yields  to  the  pressure  of  discourage- 
ment, and  supinely  submits  to  the  fate  of  cir- 
cumstance, when  he  resigns  himself  to  ineffect- 
ual moods  and  to  the  cynical  sufferance  of  the 
inevitable,  then  it  is  that  the  dead  weight  of  the 
load  long  carried  crushes  and  kills  him.  When 
the  secondary  strains  of  life  weaken  and  wreck 


i8o  SECONDARY  STRAINS 

a  man's  spirit,  he  falls  long  before  the  breaking- 
point  is  reached. 

The  strains  of  monotony  and  of  dulness,  of 
work  without  reward,  of  responsibilities  with- 
out accompanying  authority  and  the  liberty  of 
initiative,  of  the  grind  of  life  without  its  pleas- 
ures, of  patience  without  hope,  of  duty  which 
has  become  mechanical,  and  of  purposes  whose 
realization  is  merely  the  regular  antecedent  of 
their  repetition,  these  are  the  strains  from  which 
some  lives,  indeed  many  lives,  are  never  free, 
but  which  they  must  resist  until  the  end.  No 
wonder  that  many  a  stout  heart  and  brave  spirit 
grows  faint  and  fails. 

There  are  some  natures,  however,  which  are 
never  affected  in  the  least  by  any  of  these  sec- 
ondary strains  of  life,  simply  because  from  the 
beginning  they  have  yielded  constantly  to  the 
pressure  of  the  primary.  They  need  no  subtle 
weakening  process  to  prepare  them  for  failure. 
They  have  by  nature  no  moral  force,  and  there- 
fore they  instinctively  adapt  themselves  to  the 
pressure  of  native  propensity  without  so  much 
as  offering  a  show  of  resistance.  The  charac- 
ters of  Shylock  and  lago  are  determined  by  the 


SECONDARY  STRAINS  i8i 

primary  strains  of  their  own  natures;  Macbeth 
and  Hamlet,  on  the  other  hand,  are  the  victims 
of  the  complex  secondary  strains  which  served 
to  bring  naturally  great  natures  to  a  miserable 
end.  Cardinal  Woolsey  yielded  to  the  second- 
ary strains  of  his  ambition,  and  hence  his  fall; 
Richard  III,  however,  was  by  nature  inhumanly 
cruel,  and  therefore  the  primary  strains  of  his 
own  evil  spirit  determined  his  character,  his  ca- 
reer, and  his  destiny.  The  tragedy  of  the  second- 
ary strains  is  that  they  destroy  noble  lives,  turn- 
ing strength  to  weakness  and  glory  to  shame. 
The  primary  strains  are  usually  obvious. 
They  appear  within  the  sphere  of  ordinary 
observation.  We  can  reckon  with  them  and 
within  certain  limits  we  can  predict  the  results 
to  which  they  may  give  rise.  The  secondary 
strains,  however,  are  concealed.  We  are  not 
apt  to  notice  them  until  they  stand  revealed  in 
the  disasters  which  they  cause.  They  work  in- 
directly, slowly,  and  surprise  us  in  our  weakness. 
For  the  reason,  therefore,  that  these  secondary 
strains  are  so  difficult  to  recognize  and  to  pro- 
vide against,  we  should  regard  with  a  keen  sus- 
picion any  tendency  on  our  part  to  temper  the 


i82  SECONDARY  STRAINS 

rigor  of  our  moral  convictions  or  practices. 
Our  manners  may  be  flexible  but  not  our  morals. 
A  slight  relaxing  of  moral  tension  here  or  there 
in  our  conduct  may  throw  the  whole  structure  of 
our  lives  out  of  line,  and  that  always  means  a 
decreased  power  of  resistance  in  the  hour  of 
trial  which  must  inevitably  come. 

There  was  never  a  time  in  the  busy  affairs 
of  man  when  straight  conduct  was  so  much 
needed  as  now.  The  very  complexity  of  our 
modern  life  gives  scope  to  the  play  of  these  sec- 
ondary strains.  The  fever  of  excitement,  the 
intensity  of  competition,  the  struggle  for  place 
and  prominence,  the  haste  and  rush  of  the  daily 
round,  all  tend  to  increase  the  strain  and  to 
apply  the  pressure  variously  and  constantly  to 
the  weak  parts  of  our  nature.  The  mystery  is 
that  all  do  not  give  way  sooner  or  later.  The 
integrity  of  the  man,  the  whole  man, — that  alone 
can  withstand  the  strain. 

In  one  of  Kipling's  sketches,  "The  Bridge 
Builder,"  he  describes  a  young  engineer  who 
is  engaged  upon  the  construction  of  a  bridge 
across  the  river  Ganges.  In  the  midst  of  the 
work   the   floods    from    the    mountain   freshets 


SECONDARY  STRAINS  183 

swell  the  river  beyond  its  banks  and  to  the  very 
floor  of  the  bridge.  The  w^ork  is  in  imminent 
peril  of  being  swept  away  with  the  rising  waters. 
It  is  the  day  of  judgment  for  the  bridge  builder. 
"For  himself  the  crash  meant  everything — • 
everything  that  made  a  hard  life  worth  living. 
They  would  say,  the  men  of  his  own  profession 
— ^he  remembered  the  half-pitying  things  that  he 
himself  had  said  when  Lockhart's  new  water- 
works burst  and  broke  down  in  brick-heaps  and 
sludge,  and  Lockhart's  spirit  broke  in  him  and 
he  died.  He  remembered  what  he  himself  had 
said  when  the  Sumao  Bridge  went  out  in  the  big 
cyclone  by  the  sea;  and  most  he  remembered 
poor  Hartropp's  face  three  weeks  later  when  the 
shame  had  marked  it.  .  .  .  There  were  no  ex- 
cuses in  his  service.  Government  might  Hsten, 
perhaps,  but  his  own  kind  would  judge  him  by 
his  bridge,  as  that  stood  or  fell." 


This  book  is  DUE  on  the  last  date  stamped  below 


tip  3  0  1931 

MAR  1      1932 
MAR  2  1  ^932 

APR  2  5  19/ 


'^-?/ 


'JUL  24 


194^ 


URL 


if^ 


fFC?     ^Q 


'9 


J/fl^ 


Form  L-9-35»i-8,'28 


3  1158  00392  6812 


/  /  9   -  J- 


\^ 


\J 


UC  SOUTHERN  REGIONAL  LIBRARY  FACILITY 


AA    000  797  823    2 


,•-  f 


V  .•', 


VfV|f 


